
c: 1 



_36546__ 

Librtij-y of Congress 

Two Copifs Received 
AUG 20 1900 

Copyngiit entry 

S£a?NO COPY. 

Otfivered to 

OROtK DIVISION, 

_SEP 8 1900 






Copyright, 1900, by W. B. Conkey Company. 



74390 



J^' 



CONTENTS. 



PAGE. 

The Talking Oak 7 

Love and Duty .- 18 

The Golden Year. 25 

Ulysses o . . . , , 25 

Tithonus , » o 27 

Locksley Hall 30 

Godiva 44 

The Day-Dream; 

"^ ol 3g\ie , 48 

.. S^ ^eping Palace 49 

■ ?' -^eping Beauty 51 

..rival 52 

. Revival 53 

The Departure 54 

' Moral 56 

L'Envoi 56 

Epilogue 58 

Amphion 59 

St. Agnes* Eve 62 

Sir Galahad 63 

Edward Gray 66 

Will Waterproof's Ljrrical Monologue 68 

Lady Clare 76 

The Captain 79 

'^he Lord of Burleigh , 82 

The Voyage 85 

I 



4 CONTENTS. 

PAGE. 

Sir Launcelot and Queen Guinevere 88 

A Farewell 90 

The Beggar Maid 91 

The Eagle 91 

"Move Eastward, Happy Earth, and Leave" 93 

"Come Not, when I am Dead" 93 

The Letters 93 

The Vision of Sin. 95 

To , after Reading a Life and Letters 103 

To E. L., on His Travels in Greece 104 

"Break, Break, Break" 105 

The Poet's Song 106 

The Brook 107 

Aylmer's Field 115 

Sea Dreams 144 

Lucretius 157 

Ode on the Death of the Duke of Wellington 167 

The Third of February, 1853 176 

The Charge of the Light Brigade 178 

Ode Sung at the Opening of the International Exhi- 
bition 180 

A Welcome to Alexandra 183 

A Welcome to Her Royal Highness Marie Alexan- 

drovna, Duchess of Edinburgh 183 

The Grandmother 185 

Northern Farmer. Old Style 194 

Northern Farmer, New Style 199 

The Daisy 304 

To the Rev. F. D. Maurice 308 

Will 310 

In the Valley of Cauteretz 311 

In the Garden at Swainston 311 

The Flower 312 



CONTENTS. 5 

PAGE. 

Requiescat 313 

The Sailor Boy 213 

The Islet 214 

Child-Songs; 

1. The City Child 216 

2. Minnie and Winnie 217 

The Spiteful Letter , 218 

Literary Squabbles 219 

The Victim 219 

Wages 222 

The Higher Pantheism 223 

The Voice and the Peak 234 

"Flower in the Crannied Wall" 226 

A Dedication 226 

Experiments: 

Boadicea 238 

In Quantity 233 

Milton (Alcaics) 234 

(Hendecasyllabics) 234 

Specimen of a Translation of the Iliad in Blank 

Verse 235 

The Window; or, the Song of the Wrens: 

The Window 237 

On the Hill 237 

At the Window 238 

Gone 239 

Winter 239 

Spring 240 

The Letter 240 

No Answer 241 

The Answer 242 

Ay 242 

When 243 

Marriage Morning 244 



8 CONTENTS. 

CHAPTEB. PAGE. 

XI Vo Memnon, or a Youth Too Forward... . 288 

XV. Tythonus, or Satiety 289 

XVI. Juno's Suitor, or Baseness 290 

XVII. Cupid, or an Atom 291 

XVIII. Diomed, or Zeal 295 

XIX. Dsedalus, or Mechanical Skill 299 

XX. Ericthonius, or Imposture 302 

XXI. Deucalion, or Restitution 303 

XXII. Nemesis, or the Vicissitude of Things. 304J 

XXIII. Achelous, or Battle 306 

XXIV. Dionysus, or Bacchus 308 

XXV. Atalanta and Hippomenes, or Gain 313 

XXVI. Prometheus, or the State of Man 315 

XXVII. Icarus and Scylla and Charybdis, or 

the Middle Way 330 

XXVIII. Sphinx, or Science 331 

XXIX. Proserpine, or Spirit 336 

XXX. Metis, or Counsel 341 

XXXI. The Sirens, or Pleasures 342 

Apophthegms 347 

Ornamenta Rationalia; or. Elegant Sentences 390 



POEMS. 



THE TALKING OAK. 

Once more the gate behind me falls; 

Once more before my face 
I see the moulder'd Abbey-walls, 

That stand within the chace. 

Beyond the lodge the city lies, 

Beneath its drift of smoke ; 
And ah ! with what delighted eyes 

I turn to yonder oak. 

For when my passion first began, 
Ere that, which in me burn'd, 

The love, that makes me thrice a man. 
Could hope itself return'd; 

To yonder oak within the field 

I spoke without restraint, 
And with a larger faith appeal' d 

Than Papist unto Saint. 

For oft I talk'd with him apart, 
And told him of my choice. 

Until he plagiarised a heart. 
And answer 'd with a voice. 
7 



LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Tho' what he whisper'd under Heaven 
None else could understand ; 

I found him garrulously given, 
A babbler in the land. 

But since I heard him make reply 

Is many a weary hour; 
'Twere well to question him, and try 

If yet he keeps the power. 

Hail, hidden to the knees in fern, 
Broak Oak of Sumner-chace, 

Whose topmost branches can discern 
The roofs of Sumner-place ! 

Say thou, whereon I carved her name, 

If ever maid or spouse, 
As fair as my Olivia, came 

To rest beneath thy boughs. — 

"O Walter, I have shelter 'd here 

Whatever maiden grace 
The good old Summers, year by year 

Made ripe in Sumner-chace: 

"Old Summers, when the monk was fat, 
And, issuing shorn and sleek. 

Would twist his girdle tight, and pat 
The girls upon the cheek, 

**Ere yet, in scorn of Peter 's-pence. 
And number'd bead, and shrift, 

Bluff Harry broke into the spence 
And turn'd the cowls adrift: 



AND OTHER POEMS. S 

"And I have seen some score of those 
Fresh faces, that would thrive 

When his man-minded offset rose 
To chase the deer at five ; 

"And all that from the town would stroll, 
Till that wild wind made work 

In which the gloomy brewer's soul 
Went by me, like a stork : 

"The slight she-slips of loyal blood, 

And others, passing praise, 
Strait-laced, but all-too-full in bud 

For puritanic stays : 

"And I have shadow 'd many a group 

Of beauties, that were born 
In teacup-times of hood and hoop. 

Or while the patch was worn ; 

"And, leg and arm with love-knots gay, 

About me leap'd and laugh 'd 
The modish Cupid of the day, 

And shrill'd his tinsel shaft. 

"I swear (and else may insects prick 

Each leaf into a gall) 
This girl, for whom your heart is sick, 

Is three times worth them all: 

"For those and theirs, by Nature's law. 

Have faded long ago; 
But in these latter springs I saw 

Your own Olivia blow, 
2 



10 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

*'From when she gambol'd on the greens 

A baby-germ, to when 
The maiden blossoms of her teens 

Could number five from ten, 

**I swear, by leaf, and wind, and rain, 
(And hear me with thine ears), 

That, tho' I circle in the grain 
Five hundred rings of years — 

*'Yet, since I first could cast ^ shade, 

Did never creature pass 
So slightly, musically made, 

So light upon the grass: 

**For as to fairies, that will flit 
To make the greensward fresh, 

I hold them exquisitely knit, 
But far too spare of flesh. " 

Oh, hide thy knotted knees in fern, 

And overlook the chace ; 
And from thy topmost branch discern 

The roofs of Sumner- place. 

But thou, whereon I carved her name. 
That oft hast heard my vows, 

Declare when last Olivia came 
To sport beneath thy boughs. 

**0 yesterday, you know, the fair 

Was holden at the town ; 
Her father left his good arm-chair. 

And rode his hunter down. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 11 

**And with him Albert came on his. 

I look'd at him with joy: 
As cowslip unto oxlip is, 

So seems she to the boy. 

** An hour had past — and, sitting straight 
Within the low-wheel'd chaise, 

Her mother trundled to the gate 
Behind the dappled grays. 

"But as for her, she stay'd at home, 

And on the roof she went, 
And down the way you use to come, 

She look'd with discontent. 

"She left the novel half-uncut 

Upon the rosewood shelf; 
She left the new piano shut : 

She could not please herself. 

**Then ran she, gamesome as the colt, 

And livelier than a lark 
She sent her voice thro' all the holt 

Before her, and the park. 

"A light wind chased her on the wing, 

And in the chase grew wild. 
As close as might be would he cling 

About the darling child : 

"But light as any wind that blows 

So fleetly did she stir, 
The flower, she touch 'd on, dipt and rose, 

And turn'd to look at her. 



12 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

"And here she came, and round me play'd, 

And sang to me the whole 
Of those three stanzas that you made 

About my 'giant bole;' 

"And in a fit of frolic mirth 
She strove to span my waist: 

Alas, I was so broad of girth, 
I could not be embraced. 

"I vvish'd myself the fair young beech 

That here beside me stands, 
That round me, clasping each in each, 

She might have lock'd her hands. 

"Yet seem'd the pressure thrice as sweet 

As woodbine's fragile hold. 
Or when I feel about my feet 

The berried briony fold." 

O muffle round thy knees with fern, 

And shadow Sumner-chace! 
Long may thy topmost branch discern 

The roofs of Sumner-place ! 

But tell me, did she read the name 

I carved with many vows 
When last with throbbing heart I came 

To rest beneath thy boughs? 

"O 3/es, she wander 'd round and round 
These knotted knees of mine, 

And found, and kiss'd the name she found, 
And sweetly murmur'd thine. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 13 

**A teardrop trembled from its source, 

And down my surface crept, 
My sense of touch is something coarse. 

But I believe she wept. 

"Then flush'd her cheek with rosy light, 

She glanced across the plain ; 
But not a creature was in sight : 

She kiss'd me once again. 

"Her kisses were so close and kind. 

That, trust me on my word, 
Hard wood I am, and wrinkled rind, 

But yet my sap was stirr'd: 

"And even into my inmost ring 

A pleasure I discern 'd. 
Like those blind motions of the Spring, 

That show the year is turn'd. 

"Thrice-happy he that may caress 

The ringlet's waving balm — 
The cushions of whose touch may press 

The maiden's tender palm. 

"I, rooted here among the groves 

But languidly adjust 
My vapid vegetable loves 

With anthers and with dust: 

"For ah ! my friend, the days were brief 

Whereof the poets talk, 
When that, which breathes within the leaf 

Could slip its bark and walk. 



14 LOCKSLEY HALL. 

"But could I, as in times foregone, 
From spray, and branch, and stem. 

Have suck'd and gather'd into one 
The life that spreads in them, 

"She had not found me so remiss; 

But lightly issuing thro', 
I would have paid her kiss for kiss, 

With usury thereto." 

O flourish high, with leafy towers, 

And overlook the lea, 
Pursue thy loves among the bowers 

But leave thou mine to me. 

O flourish, hidden deep in fern, 

Old oak, I love thee well ; 
A thousand thanks for what I learn 

And what remains to tell. 

" 'Tis little more: the day was warm; 

At last, tired out with play. 
She sank her head upon her arm 

And at my feet she lay. 

"Her eyelids dropp'd their silken eaves. 

I breathed upon her eyes 
Thro' all the summer of my leaves 

A welcome mix'd with sighs. 

"I took the swarming sound of life — 
The music from the town — 

The murmurs of the drum and fife 
And lull'd them in my own. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 15 

** Sometimes I let a sunbeam slip, 

To light her shaded eye ; 
A second flutter'd round her lip 

Like a golden butterfly ; 

*'A third would glimmer on her neck 

To make the necklace shine ; 
Another slid, a sunny fleck, 

From head to ancle fine, 

**Then close and dark my arms I spread 

And shadow 'd all her rest — 
Dropt dews upon her golden head, 

An acorn in her breast. 

*'But in a pet she started up. 

And pluck'd it out, and drew 
My little oakling from the cup, 

And flung him in the dew. 

**And yet it was a graceful gift — 

I felt a pang within 
As when I see the woodman lift 

His axe to slay my kin. 

**I shook him down because he was 

The finest on the tree. 
He lies beside thee on the grass ! 

O kiss him once for me. 

'*0 kiss him twice and thrice for me, 

That have no lips to kiss. 
For never yet was oak on lea 

Shall grow so fair as this." 



16 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Step deeper yet in herb and fern, 
Look further thro' the chace, 

Spread upward till thy boughs discern 
The front of Sumner-place. 

This fruit of thine by Love is blest, 

That but a moment lay 
Where fairer fruit of Love may rest 

Some happy future day. 

I kiss it twice, I kiss it thrice, 
The warmth it thence shall win 

To riper life may magnetise 
The baby-oak within. 

But thou, while kingdoms overset, 
Or lapse from hand to hand, 

Thy leaf shall never fail, nor yet 
Thine acorn in the land. 

May never saw dismember thee, 

Nor wielded axe disjoint. 
That art the fairest-spoken tree 

From here to Lizard-point. 

O rock upon thy towery-top 
All throats that gurgle sweet ! 

All starry culmination drop 
Balm- dews to bathe thy feet! 

All grass of silky feather grow — 
And while he sinks or swells 

The full south-breeze around thee blow 
The sound of minster bells. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 17 

The fat earth feed thy branchy root, 

That under deeply strikes! 
The northern morning o'er thee shoot, 

High up, in silver spikes ! 

Nor ever lightning char thy grain, 

But, rolling as in sleep, 
Low thunders bring the mellow rain, 

That makes thee broad and deep! 

And hear me swear a solemn oath, 

That only by thy side 
Will I to Olive plight my troth. 

And gain her for my bride. 

And when my marriage morn may fall. 

She, Dryad-like, shall wear 
Alternate leaf and acorn-ball 

In wreath about her hair. 

And I will work in prose and rhyme, 
And praise thee more in both 

Than bard has honor'd beech or lime, 
Or that Thessalian growth, 

In which the swarthy ringdove sat, 

And mystic sentence spoke; 
And more than England honors that 

Thy famous brother-oak. 

Wherein the younger Charles abode 

Till all the paths were dim, 
And far below the Roundhead rode, 

And humm'd a surly hymn. 

2 LocksleyHaU 



18 LOCKSLEY HALL, 



LOVE AND DUTY. 

Of love that never found his earthly close, 
What sequel? Streaming eyes and breaking 

hearts, 
Or all the same as if he had not been? 

Not so. Shall Error in the round of time 
Still father Truth? O shall the braggart shout 
For some blind glimpse of freedom work itself 
Thro' madness, hated by the wise, to law 
System and empire? Sin itself be found 
The cloudy porch oft opening on the Sun? 
And only he, this wonder, dead, become 
Mere highway dust? or year by year alone 
Sit brooding in the ruins of a life, 
Nightmare of youth, the spectre of himself? 

If this were thus, if this, indeed, were all, 
Better the narrow brain, the stony heart. 
The staring eye glazed o'er with sapless 'days, 
The long mechanic pacings to and fro. 
The set gray life, and apathetic end. 
But am I not the nobler thro' thy love? 
O three times less unworthy ! likewise thou 
Art more thro' Love, and greater than thy 

years. 
The Sun will run his orbit, and the Moon 
Her circle. Wait, and Love himself will bring 
The drooping flower of knowledge changed to 

fruit 
Of wisdom. Wait : my faith is large in Time, 
And that which shapes it to some perfect end. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 19 

Will some one say, Then why not ill for 

good? 
Why took ye not your pastime? To that man 
My work shall answer, since I knew the right 
And did it; for a man is not as God, 
But then most Godlike being most a man. 
—So let me think 'tis well for thee and me — 
Ill-fated that I am, what lot is mine 
Whose foresight preaches peace, my heart so 

slow 
To feel it ! For how hard it seem'd to me, 
When eyes, love-languid thro' half tears would 

dwell 
One earnest, earnest moment upon mine, 
Then not to dare to see! when thy low voice, 
Faltering, would break its syllables, to keep 
My own full- tuned, — hold passion in a leash, 
And not leap forth and fall about thy neck. 
And on thy bosom (deep desired relief!) 
Rain out the heavy mist of tears, that weigh'd 
Upon my brain, my senses and my soul! 

For love himself took part against himself 
To warn us off, and Duty loved of Love — 
O this world's curse, — beloved but hated — 

came 
Like Death betwixt thy dear embrace and 

mine. 
And crying, "Who is this? behold thy bride," 
She push'd me from thee. 

If the sense is hard 
To alien ears, I did not speak to these — 
No, not to thee, but to thyself in me: 



20 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Hard is my doom and thine : thou knowest it 

all. 

Could Love part thus: was it not well to 

speak, 
To have spoken once? It could not but be 

well. 
The vSlow sweet hours that bring us all things 

good, 
The slow sad hours that bring us all things ill, 
And all good things from evil, brought the 

night 
In which we sat together and alone, 
And to the want, that hoUow'd all the heart, 
Gave utterance by the yearning of an eye, 
That burn'd upon its object thro' such tears 
As flow but once a life. 

The trance gave way 
To those caresses, when a hundred times 
In that last kiss, which never was the last. 
Farewell, like endless welcome, lived and died. 
Then follow 'd counsel, comfort, and the words 
That make a man feel strong in speaking 

truth ; 
Till now the dark was worn, and overhead 
The lights of sunset and of sunrise mix'd 
In that brief night; the summer night, that 

paused 
Among her stars to hear us; stars that hung 
Love-charm'd to listen : all the wheels of Time 
Spun round in station, but the end had come. 

O then like those, who clench their nerves to 

TMSh 



AND OTHER POEMS. 21 

Upon their dissolution, we two rose, 
There — closing like an individual life — 
In one blind cry of passion and of pain, 
Like bitter accusation ev'n to death. 
Caught up the whole of love and utter'd it, 
And bade adieu forever. 

Live — yet live — 
Shall sharpest pathos blight us, knowing all 
Life needs for life is possible to will — 
Live happy; tend thy flowers; be tended by 
My blessing! Should my Shadow cross thy 

thoughts 
Too sadly for their peace, remand it thou 
For calmer hours to Memory's darkest hold, 
If not to be forgotten — not at once — 
Not all forgotten. Should it cross thy dreams, 
O might it come like one that looks content, 
With quiet eyes unfaithful to the truth. 
And point thee forward to a distant light, 
Or seem to lift a burthen from thy heart 
And leave thee freer, till thou wake refresh 'd 
Then when the first low matin-chirp hath 

grown 
Full quire, and morning driv'n her plow of 

pearl 
Far furrowing into light the mounded rack, 
Beyond the fair green field and eastern sea. 



22 LOCKSLEY HALL. 



THE GOLDEN YEAR. 

Well, you shall have that song which Leonard 

wrote : 
It was last summer on a tour in Wales :- 
Old James was with me : we that day had been 
Up Snowdon; and I wish'd for Leonard there, 
And found him in Llanberis: then we crost 
Between the lakes, and clamber' d half way up 
The counter side ; and that same song of his 
He told me; for I banter'd him, and swore 
They said he lived shut up within himself, 
A tongue-tied Poet in the feverous days, 
That, setting the how much before the how. 
Cry, like the daughters of the horseleech, 

"Give, 
Cram us with all," but count not me the herd! 

To which, "They call me what they will, " 

he said: 
"But I was born too late: the fair new forms, 
That float about the threshold of an age, 
Like truths of Science waitins^ to be cauofht — 
Catch me who can, and make the catcher 

crown 'd — 
Are taken by the forelock. Let it be. 
But if you care indeed to listen, hear 
These measured words, my work of yester- 

morn. 

"We sleep and wake and sleep, but all 
things move ; 
The Sun flies forward to his brother Sun ; 



AXD OTHER POEMS. 23 

The dark Earth follows wheel'd in her ellipse; 
And human things returning on themselves 
Move onward, leading up the golden year. 

**Ah, tho' the times, when some new thought 
can bud. 
Are but as poets* seasons when they flov/er, 
Yet seas, that daily gain upon the shore, 
Have ebb and flow conditioning their march, 
And slow and sure comes up the golden year. 

"When wealth no more shall rest in mounded 
heaps, 
But smit with freer light shall slowly melt 
In many streams to fatten lower lands. 
And light shall spread, and man be liker man 
Thro' all the season of the golden year. 

"Shall eagles not be eagles? wrens be wrens? 
If all the world were falcons, what of that? 
The wonder of the eagle were the less. 
But he not less the eagle. Happy days 
Roll onward, leading up the golden year. 

"Fly, happy happy sails, and bear the Press 
Fly happy with the mission of the Cross ; 
Knit land to land, and blowing havenward 
With silks, and fruits, and spices, clear of toll, 
Enrich the markets of the golden year. 

"But we grow old. Ah! when shall all 
men's good 
Be each man's rule, and universal Peace 
Lie like a shaft of light across the land. 



24 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

And like a lane of beams athwart the sea, 
Thro' all the circle of the golden year. " 

Thus far he flow'd, and ended; whereupon 
*'Ah, folly!" in mimic cadence answer'd 

James — 
**Ah, folly! for it lies so far away, 
Not in our time, nor in our children's time, 
'Tis like the second world to us that live; 
'Twere all as one to fix our hopes on Heaven 
As on this vision of the golden year." 

With that he struck his staff against the 

rocks 
And broke it, — James, — you know him, — old, 

but full 
Of force and choler, and firm upon his feet, 
And like an oaken stock in winter woods, 
O'erflourished with the hoary clematis: 
Then added, all in heat: 

"What stuff is this! 
Old writers push'd the happy season back, — 
The more fools they, — we forward: dreamers 

both: 
You must, that in an age, when every hour 
Must sweat her sixty minutes to the death, 
Live on, God love us, as if the seedsman, rapt 
Upon the teeming harvest, should not plunge 
His hand into the bag: but well I know 
That unto him who works, and feels he works, 
This same grand year is ever at the doors, " 

He spoke; and, high above, I heard them 
blast 



AND OTHER POEMS. 25 

The steep slate-quarry, and the great echo flap 
And buffet round the hills, from bluff to bluff. 



ULYSSES. 

It little profits that an idle king, 
By this still hearth, among these barren crags, 
Match 'd with an aged wife, I mete and dole 
Unequal laws unto a savage race. 
That hoard, and sleep, and feed, and know not 
me. 

I cannot rest from travel : I will drink 
Life to the lees: all times I have enjoy 'd 
Greatly, have suffer'd greatly, both with 

those 
That loved me, and alone; on shore, and 

when 
Thro' scudding drifts the rainy Hyades 
Vext the dim sea : I am become a name ; 
For always roaming with a hungry heart 
Much have I seen and known ; cities of men 
And manners, climates, councils, govern- 
ments. 
Myself not least, but honor'd of them all; 
And drunk delight of battle with my peers, 
Far on the ringing plains of windy Troy. 
I am a part of all that I have ment ; 
Yet all experience is an arch wherethro* 
Gleams that untravel'd world, whose margin 

fades 
Forever and forever when I move. 



26 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

How dull it is to pause, to make an end, 
To rust unburnish'd, not to shine in use! 

As tho' to breathe were life. Life piled on 
life 
Were all too little, and of one to me 
Little remains: but every hour is saved 
From that eternal silence, something more, 
A bring-er of new things; and vile it were 
For some three suns to store and heard myself, 
And this gray spirit yearning in desire 
To follow knowledge like a sinking star, 
Beyond the utmost bound of human thought. 

This is my son, mine own Telemachus, 
To whom I leave the sceptre and the isle — 
Well-loved of me, discerning to fulfil 
This labor, by slow prudence to make mild 
A rugged people, and thro' soft degrees 
Subdue them to the useful and the good. 
Most blameless is he, centered in the sphere 
Of common duties, decent not to fail 
In offices of tenderness, and pay 
Meet adoration to my household gods, 
When I am gone. He works his work, I mine. 

There lies the port ; the vessel puffs her sail : 
There gloom the dark broad seas. My mari- 
ners. 
Souls that have toil'd, and wrought, and 

thought with me — 
That ever with a frolic welcome took 
The thunder and the sunshine, and opposed 
Free hearts, free foreheads — you and I are old; 



AND OTHER POEMS. 27 

Old age hath yet his honor and his toil ; 
Death closes all : but something ere the end, 
Some work of noble note, may yet be done, 
Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods. 
The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks : 
The long day wanes : the slow moon climbs : 

the deep 
Moans round with many voices. Come, my 

friends, 
'Tis not too late to seek a newer world. 
Push off, and sitting well in order smite 
The sounding furrows ; for my purpose holds 
To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths 
Of all the western stars, until I die. 
It may be that the gulfs will wash us down: 
It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles, 
And see the great Achilles, whom we knew. 
Tho' much is taken, much abides; and tho' 
We are not now that strength which in old days 
Moved earth and heaven ; that which we are, 

we are; 
One equal temper of heroic hearts. 
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in 

will 
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield. 



TITHONUS. 

The woods decay, the woods decay and fall. 
The vapors weep their burthen to the ground, 
Man comes and tills the field and lies beneath, 
And after many a summer dies the swan. 



28 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Me only cruel immortality 

Consumes : I wither slowly in thine arms, 

Here at the quiet limit of the world, 

A white-hair'd shadow roaming like a dream 

The ever-silent spaces of the East, 

Far-folded mists, and gleaming halls of morn. 

Alas! for this gray shadow, once a man — 
So glorious in his beauty and thy choice, 
Who madest him thy chosen, that he seem'd 
To his great heart none other than a God ! 
I ask'd thee, *'Give me immortality." 
Then didst thou grant mine asking with a 

smile. 
Like wealthy men who care not how they 

give. 
But thy strong Hours indignant work'd their 

wills, 
And beat me down and marr'd and wasted me, 
And tho' they could not end me, left me 

maim'd 
To dwell in presence of immortal youth, 
Immortal age beside immortal youth. 
And all I was, in ashes. Can thy love, 
Thy beauty, make amends, tho' even now, 
Close over us, the silver star, thy guide, 
Shines in those tremulous eyes that fill with 

tears 
To hear me? Let me go: take back thy gift: 
Why should a man desire in any way 
To vary from the kindly race of men, 
Or pass beyond the goal of ordinance 
Where all should pause, as is most meet for 

all? 



AND OTHER POEMS. 29 

A soft air fans the cloud apart ; there comes 
A glimpse of that dark world where I was 

born. 
Once more the old mysterious glimmer steals 
From thy pure brows, and from thy shoulders 

pure, 
And bosom beating with a heart renew'd. 
Thy cheek begins to redden thro' the gloom, 
Thy sweet eyes brighten slowly close to mine, 
Ere yet they blind the stars, and the wild team 
Which love thee, yearning for thy yoke, 

arise, 
And shake the darkness from their loosen'd 

manes. 
And beat the twilight into flakes of fire. 

Lo! ever thus thou growest beautiful 
In silence, then before thine answer given 
Departest, and thy fears are on my cheek. 

Why wilt thou ever scare me with thy tears, 
And make me tremble lest a saying learnt, 
In days far-off, on that dark earth, be true? 
*'The Gods themselves cannot recall their 
gifts." 

Ay me! ay me! with what another heart 
In days far-off, and with what other eyes 
I used to watch — if I be he that watch 'd — 
The lucid outline forming round thee; saw 
The dim curls kindle into sunny rings; 
Changed with thy mystic change, and felt my 

blood 
Glow with the glow that slowly crimson 'd all 



30 LOCKSLEY HALL. 

Th}^ presence and thy portals, while I lay, 
Mouth, forehead, eyelids, growing dewy-warm 
With kisses balmier than half-openings buds 
Of April, and could hear the lips that kiss'd 
Whispering I knew not what of wild and sweet, 
Like that strange song I heard Apollo sing, 
While Ilion like a mist rose into towers. 

Yet hold me not forever in thine East : 
How can my nature longer mix with thine? 
Coldly thy rosy shadows bathe me, cold 
Are all thy lights, and cold my wrinkled feet 
Upon thy glimmering thresholds, when the 

steam 
Floats up from those dim fields about the homes 
Of happy men that have the power to die, 
And grassy barrows of the happier dead. 
Release me, and restore me to the ground; 
Thou seest all things, thou wilt see my grave : 
Thou wilt renew thy beauty morn by morn ; 
I earth in earth forget these empty courts. 
And thee returning on thy silver wheels. 



LOCKSLEY HALL. 

Comrades, leave me here a little, while as yet 

'tis early morn : 
Leave me here, and when you want me, sound 

upon the bugle horn. 

*Tis the place, and all around it, as of old, the 
curlews call, 



AND OTHER POEMS. 31 

Dreary gleams about the moorland flying over 
Locksley Hall; 

Locksley Hall, that in the distance overlooks 
the sandy tracks, 

And the hollow ocean-ridges roaring into cat- 
aracts. 

Many a night from yonder ivied casement, ere 

I went to rest. 
Did I look on great Orion sloping slowly to the 

West. 

Many a night I saw the Pleiads, rising thro* 

the mellow shade, 
Glitter like a swarm of fire-flies tangled in a v 

silver braid. / 

Here about the beach I wander'd, nourishing 

a youth sublime 
With the fairy tales of science, and the long 

result of Time ; 

When the centuries behind me like a fruitful 
land reposed ; 

When I clung to all the present for the prom- 
ise that it closed : 

When I dipt into the future far as human eye 
; could see; 

iSa^ the Vision of the world, and all the won- 
der that would be. 

In the Spring a fuller crimson comes upon the 
robin's breast; 



32 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

In the Spring the wanton lapwing gets himself 
another crest; 

In the Spring a livelier iris changes on the 

burnish'd dove; 
In the Spring a young man's fancy lightly 

turns to thoughts of love. 

Then her cheek was pale and thinner than 

should be for one so young, 
And her eyes on all my motions with a mute 

observance hung. 

And I said, "My cousin Amy, speak, and speak 

the truth to me. 
Trust me, cousin, all the current of my being 

sets to thee." 

On her pallid cheek and forehead came a color 

and a light, 
As I have seen the rosy red flushing in the 

northern night. 

And she turn'd — her bosom shaken with a 

sudden storm of sighs — 
All the spirit deeply dawning in the dark of 

hazel eyes — 

Saying, "I have hid my feelings, fearing they 
should do me wrong;" 

Saying, "Dost thou love me, cousin?" weep- 
ing, "I have loved thee long." 

Love took up the glass of Time, and turn'd it 
in his glowing hands; 



AND OTHER POEMS. 33 

Every moment, lightly shaken, ran itself in 
golden sands. 

Love took up the harp of Life, and smote on 

all the chords with might ; 
Smote the chord of Self, that, trembling, pass'd 

in music out of sight. 

Many a morning on the moorland did we hear 

the copses ring, 
And her whisper throng'd my pulses with the 

fulness of the Spring. 

Many an evening by the waters did we watch 

the stately ships, 
And our spirits rush'd together at the touching 

of the lips. 

O my cousin, shallow-hearted! O my Amy, 

mine no more! 
O the dreary, dreary moorland ! O the barren, 

barren shore! 

Falser than all fancy fathoms, falser than all 

songs have sung. 
Puppet to a father's threat, and servile to a 

shrewish tongue! 

Is it well to wish thee, happy? — having known 

me — to decline 
On a range of lower feelings and a narrower 

heart than mine ! 

Yet it shall be : thou shalt lower to his level 
day by day, 

3 LocksleyHall 



34 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

What is fine within thee growing coarse to 
sympathise with clay. 

As the husband is, the wife is: thou art mated 

with a clown, 
And the grossness of his nature will have 

weight to drag thee down. 

He will hold thee, when his passion shall have 

spent its novel force, 
Something better than his dog, a little dearer 

than his horse. 

What is this? his eyes are heavy: think not 

they are glazed with wine. 
Go to him : it is thy duty : kiss him : take his 

hand in thine. 

It may be my lord is weary, that his brain is 

overwrought : 
Soothe him with thy finer fancies, touch him 

with thy lighter thought. 

He will answer to the purpose, easy things to 

understand — 
Better thou wert dead before me, tho' I slew 

thee with my hand ! 

Better thou and I were lying, hidden from the 

heart's disgrace, 
Roll'd in one another's arms, and silent in a 

last embrace. 

Cursed be the social wants that sin against the 
strength of youth ! 



AND OTHER POEMS. 35 

Cursed be the social lies that warp us from the 
living truth ! 

Cursed be the sickly forms that err from hon- 
est Nature's rule! 

Cursed be the gold that gilds the straiten 'd 
forehead of the fool ! 

Well— 'tis well that I should bluster!— Hadst 
thou less unworthy proved — 

Would to God — for I had loved thee more than 
ever wife was loved. 

Am I mad, that I should cherish that which 

bears but bitter fruit? 
I will pluck it from my bosom, tho' my heart 

be at the root. 

Never, tho' my mortal summers to such length 

of years should come 
As the many-winter'd crow that leads the 

clanging rookery home. 

Where is comfort? in division of the records of 

the mind? 
Can I part her from herself, and love her, as I 
. knew her, kind? 

1 remember one that perish' d: sweetly did she 

speak and move : 
Such a one do I remember, whom to look at 

was to love. 

Can I think of her as dead, and love her for 
the love she bore? 



3& LOCKSLEY HALL, 

No — she never loved me truly : love is love for 
evermore. 

Comfort? comfort scorn 'd of devils! this is 
truth the poet sings, 

That a sorrow's crown of sorrow is remember- 
ing happier things. 

Drug thy memories, lest thou learn it, lest thy 

heart be put to proof, 
In the dead unhappy night, and when the rain 

is on the roof. 

Like a dog, he hunts in dreams, and thou art 

staring at the wall. 
Where the dying night-lamp flickers, and the 

shadows rise and fall. 

Then a hand shall pass before thee, pointing 

to his drunken sleep. 
To thy widow'd marriage-pillows, to the tears 

that thou wilt weep. 

Thou Shalt hear the '* Never, never," whisper 'd 
by the phantom years, 

And a song from out the distance in the ring- 
ing of thine ears ; 

And an eye shall vex thee, looking ancient 

kindness on thy pain. 
Turn thee, turn thee on thy pillow : get thee 

to thy rest again. 

Nay, but Nature brings thee solace ; for a ten- 
der voice will cry. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 37 

'Tis purer life than thine ; a lip to drain thy 
trouble dry. 

Baby lips will laugh me down : my latest rival 

brings thee rest. 
Baby fingers, waxen touches, press me from 

the mother's breast. 

O, the child too clothes the father with a dear- 

ness not his due. 
Half is thine and half is his: it will be worthy 

of the two. 

O, I see thee old and formal, fitted to thy petty 

part, 
With a little hoard of maxims preaching down 

a daughter's heart. 

*'They were dangerous guides the feelings — ■ 
she herself was not exempt — 

Truly, she herself had suffer 'd" — Perish in thy 
self -contempt! 

Overlive it — lower yet — be happy ! wherefore 

should I care? 
I myself must mix with action, lest I wither 

by despair. 

What is that which I should turn to, lighting^ 

upon days like these? 
Every door is barr'd with gold, and opens but 

to golden keys. 

Every gate is throng' d with suitors, all the 
markets overflow. 



38 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

I have but an angry fancy : what is that which 
I should do? 

I had been content to perish, falling on the 

foeman's ground, 
When the ranks are roll'd in vapor, and the 

winds are laid with sound. 

But the jingling of the guinea helps the hurt 

that Honor feels, 
And the nations do but murmur, snarling at 

each other's heels. 

Can I but relive in sadness? I will turn that 
earlier page. 

Hide me from my deep emotion, O thou won- 
drous Mother- Age ! 

Make me feel the wild pulsation that I felt 

before the strife, 
When I heard my days before me, and the 

tumult of my life ; 

Yearning for the large excitement that the 

coming years would yield. 
Eager-hearted as a boy when first he leaves 

his father's field, 

And at night along the dusky highway near 

and nearer drawn. 
Sees in heaven the light of London flaring 

like a dreary dawn ; 

And his spirit leaps within him to be gone 
before him then, 



AND OTHER POEMS. 39 

Underneath the light he looks at, in among the 
throngs of men : 

Men, my brothers, men the workers, ever reap- 
ing something new : 

That which they have done but earnest of the 
things that they shall do : 

For I dipt into the future, far as human eye 
could see, 

Saw the Vision of the world, and all the won- 
der that would be ; 

"^ 
Saw the heavens fill with commerce, argosies 

of magic sails, 
Pilots of the purple twilight, dropping down 

with costly bales; 

Heard the heavens fill with shouting, and there 

rain'd ^ ghastly dew 
From the nation's airy navies grappling in the 

central blue; 

Far along the world-wide whisper of the south- 
wind rushing warm, 

With the standards of the peoples plunging 
thro' the thunder-storm; 

Till the war-drum throb'd no longer, and the \ 

battle-flags were furl'd 
In the Parliament of man, the Federalion of 

the world. 

There the common sense of most shall hold 
a fretful realm in awe, 



40 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

And the kindly earth shall slumber, lapt in 
universal law. 

So I triumph'd ere my passion sweeping thro' 

me left me dry, 
Left me with the palsied heart, and left me 

with the jaundiced eye; 

Eye, to which all order festers, all things here 

are out of joint ; 
Science moves, but slowly, slowly creeping on 

from point to point: 

Slowly comes a hungry people, as a lion creep- 
ing nigher, 

Glares at one that nods and winks behind a 
slowly-dying fire. 

Yet I doubt not thro' the ages one increasing 

purpose runs. 
And the thoughts of men are widen'd with the 

process of the suns. 

What is that to him that reaps not harvest of 

his youthful joys, 
Tho' the deep heart of existence beat forever 

like a boy's? 

Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers, and I 

linger on the shore, 
And the individual withers, and world is more 

and more. 

Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers, and he 
bears a laden breast, 



AND OTHER POEMS. 41 

Full of sad experience, moving toward the still- 
ness of his rest. 

Hark, my merry comrades call me, sounding 
on the bugle-horn, 

They to whom my foolish passion were a tar- 
get for their scorn : 

Shall it not be scorn to me to harp on such a 

moulder'd string? 
I am shamed thro' all my nature to have loved 

so slight a thing. 

Weakness to be wroth with weakness! woman's 

pleasure, woman's pain — 
Nature made them blinder motions bounded 

in a shallower brain : 

Woman is the lesser man, and all thy passions, 

match 'd with mine. 
Are as moonlight unto sunlight, and as water 

unto wine — 

Here at least, where nature sickens, nothing. > 
Ah, for some retreat \ 

Deep in yonder shining Orient, where my life 
began to beat; • - ' 

Where in wild Mahratta-battle fell my father 

evil-starr'd; — 
I was left a trampled orphan, and a selfish 

uncle's ward. 

Or to burst all links of habit — there to wander 
far away, 
4 



42 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

On from island unto island at the gateways of 
^ the day. 

Larger constellations burning, mellow moons 

and happy skies, 
Breadths of tropic shade and palms in cluster, 

knots of Paradise. 

Never comes the trader, never floats an Euro- 
pean flag, 

Slides the bird o'er lustrous woodland, swings 
the trailer from the crag ; 

Droops the heavy- blossom 'd bower, hangs the 

heavy-fruited tree — 
Summer isles of Eden lying in dark-purple 

spheres of sea. 

There methinks would be enjoyment more than 

in this march of mind. 
In the steamship, in the railway, in the 

thoughts that shake mankind. 

There the passions cramp 'd no longer shall 
have scope and breathing space ; 

I will take some savage woman, she shall rear 
my dusky race. 

Iron-jointed, supple-sinew'd, they shall dive, 

and they shall run. 
Catch the wild goat by the hair, and hurl their 

lances in the sun ; 

Whistle back the parrot's call, and leap the 
rainbows of the brooks, 



AND OTHER POEMS. 43 

Not with blinded eyesight poring over misera- 
ble books — 

Fool, again the dream, the fancy! but I know 

my words are wild, 
But I count the gray barbarian lower than the 

Christian child. 

I, to herd with narrow foreheads, vacant of our 

glorious gains. 
Like a beast with lower pleasures, like a beast 

with lower pains ! 

Mated with a squalid savage — what to me were 

sun or clime? 
I the heir of all the ages, in the foremost files 

of time — 

I that rather held it better men should perish 

one by one, 
Than that earth should stand at gaze like 

Joshua's moon in Ajalon ! 

Not in vain the distance beacons. Fcrvv-ard, 

forward let us range. 
Let the g^eat world spin forever down the 

ringing grooves of change. 

Thro' the shadow of the globe we sweep into 

the younger day : 
Better fifty years of Europe than a cycle of 

Cathay. 

Mother-Age (for mine I knew not) help me as 
when life begun: 



a LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Rift the hills, and roll the waters, flash the 
lightnings, weigh the Sun. 

O, T see the crescent promise of my spirit hath 

not set. 
Ancient founts of inspiration well thro' all my 

fancy yet. 

Howsoever these things be, a long farewell to 

Locksley Hall! 
Now for me the woods may wither, now for 

me the roof-tree fall. 

Comes a vapor from the margin, blackening 

over heath and holt, 
Cramming all the blast before it, in its breast 

a thunderbolt. 

Let it fall on Locksley Hall, with rain or hail, 

or fire or snow ; 
For the mighty wind arises, roaring seaward, 
and I go. 



GODIVA. 

I waited for the train at Coventry; 

I hung with grooms and porters on the bridge, 

To watch the three tall spires; and there I 

shaped 
The city's ancient legend into this: — 

Not only we, the latest seed of Time, 
New men, that in the flying of a wheel 



AND OTHER POEMS. 45 

Cry down the past, not only we, that prate 
Of rights and wrongs, have loved the people 

well, 
And loathed to see them overtax'd; but she 
Did more, and underwent, and overcame. 
The woman of a thousand summers back, 
Godiva, wife to that grim Earl, who ruled 
In Coventry : for when he laid a tax 
Upon his town, and all the mothers brought 
Their children, clamoring, "If we pay, we 

starve, ' ' 
She sought her lord, and found him, where he 

strode 
About the hall, among his dogs, alone, 
His beard a foot before him, and his hair 
A yard behind. She told him of their tears, 
And pray'd him, *'If they pay this tax, they 

starve." 
Whereat he stared, replying, half-amazed, 
*'You would not let your little finger ache 
For such as these?" — "But I would die," said 

she. 
He laugh 'd, and swore by Peter and by Paul: 
Then fillip'd at the diamond in her ear ; 
*'0h ay, ay, ay, you talk" — "Alas," she said, 
"But prove me what it is I would not do." 
And from a heart as rough as Esau's hand, 
He answer'd, "Ride you naked thro' the town. 
And I repeal it;" and nodding, as in scorn, 
He parted, with great strides among his dogSL 

So left alone, the passions of her mind. 
As winds from all the compass shift and blow. 
Made war upon each other for an hour. 



46 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Till pity won. She sent a herald forth, 
And bade him cry, with sound of trumpet, all 
The hard condition; but that she would loose 
The people: therefore, as they loved her well, 
From then till noon no foot should pace the 

street, 
No eye look down, she passing; but that all 
Should keep within, door shut, and window 

barr'd. 

Then fled she to her inmost bower, and there 
Unclasp 'd the wedded eagles of her belt. 
The grim Earl's gift; but ever at a breath 
She linoer'd, looking like a summer moon 
Half-dipt in cloud: anon she shook her head. 
And shower'd the rippled ringlets to her knee; 
Unclad herself in haste; adown the stair 
Stole on; and, like a creeping sunbeam, slid 
From pillar unto pillar, until she reached 
The gateway; there she found her palfrey trapt 
In purple blazon 'd with armorial gold. 

Then she rode forth, clothed on with chastity: 
The deep air listen'd round her as she rode, 
And all the low wind hardly breathed for fear. 
The little wide-mouth'd heads upon the spout 
Had cunning eyes to see : the barking cur 
Made her cheek flame : her palfrey's footfall shot 
Light horrors thro, her pulses : the blind walls 
Were full of chinks and holes ; and overhead 
Fantastic gables, crowding, stared : but she 
Not less thro' all bore up, till, last, she saw 
The white-flower'd elder-thicket from the field 
Gleam thro' the Gothic archway in the wall. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 47 

Then she rode back, clothed on with chastity: 
And one low churl, compact of thankless earth. 
The fatal byword of all years to come, 
Boring a little auger-hole in fear, 
Peep'd — but his eyes, before they had their will, 
Were shrivel'd into darkness in his head. 
And dropt before him. So the Powers, who 

wait 
On noble deeds, cancel'd a sense misused; 
And she, that knew not, pass'd : and all at once, 
With twelve great shocks of sound, the shame- 
less noon 
Was clash 'd and hammer'd from a hundred 

towers, 
One after one; but even then she gain'd 
Her bower; whence reissuing, robed and 

crown 'd. 
To meet her lord, she took the tax away 
And built herself an everlasting name. 



48 LOCKSLEY HALL, 



THE DAY-DREAM. 



PROLOGUE. 

O Lady Flora, let me speak: 

A pleasant hour has passed away 
While, dreaming on your damask cheek 

The dewy sister-eyelids lay. 
As by the lattice you reclined, 

I went thro' many wayward moods 
To see you dreaming — and, behind, 

A summer crisp with shining woods. 
And I too dream'd, until at last 

Across my fancy, brooding warm. 
The reflex of a legend past, 

And loosely settled into form. 
And would you have the thought I had, 

And see the vision that I saw, 
Then take the broidery-frame, and add 

A crimson to the quaint Macaw, 
And I will tell it. Turn your face. 

Nor look with that too-earnest eye — 
The rhymes are dazzled from their place, 

And order 'd words asunder fly. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 49- 

THE SLEEPING PALACE. 



The varying year with blade, and sheaf 

Clothes and reclothes the happy plains. 
Here rests the sap within the leaf, 

Here stays the blood along the veins. 
Fain shadows, vapors lightly curl'd. 

Faint murmurs from the meadows come, 
Like hints and echoes of the world 

To spirits folded in the womb. 

II. 

Soft lustre bathes the range of urns 

On every slanting terrace-lawn. 
The fountain to his place returns 

Deep in the garden lake withdrawn. 
Here droops the banner on the tower, 

On the hall-hearths the festal fires, 
The peacock in his laurel bower, 

The parrot in his gilded wires. 

III. 

Roof-haunting martins warm their eggs: 

In these, in those the life is stay'd. 
The mantles from the golden pegs 

Droop sleepily : no sound is made, 
Not even of a gnat that sings. 

More like a picture seemeth all 
Than those old portraits of old kings, 

That watch the sleepers from the wall. 

4 Locksley Hall 



50 LOCKSLEY HALL. 

IV. 

Here sits the Butler with a flask 

Between his knees, half-drain'd, and there 

The wrinkled steward at his task, 
The maid-of-honor blooming fair; 

The page has caught her hand in his: 
Her lips are sever'd as to speak : 

His own are pouted to a kiss: 
i The blush is fix'd upon her cheek. 



Till all the hundred summers pass, 

The beams, that thro' the Oriel shine, 
Make prisms in every carven glass. 

And beaker brimm'd with noble wine. 
Each baron at the banquet sleeps, 

Grave faces gather'd in a ring. 
His state the king reposing keeps. 

He must have been a jovial king. 

VI. 

All round a hedge upshoots, and shows 
At distance like a little wood ; 
Thorns, ivies, woodbine, mistletoes, 

And grapes with bunches red as blood; 
All creeping plants, a wall of green 

Close-matted, bur and brake and briar, 
And glimpsing over these, just seen, 

High up, the topmost palace spire. 

VII. 

When will the hundred summers die, 
And thought and time be born again, 



AND OTHER POEMS. 51 

And newer knowledge, drawing nigh, 
Bring truth that sways the soul of men ! 

Here all things in their place remain. 
As all were order'd, ages since. 

Come, Care and Pleasure, Hope and Pain, 
And bring the fated fairy Prince. 



THE SLEEPING BEAUTY. 



Year after year unto her feet, 

She lying on her couch alone, 
Across the purple coverlet, 

The maiden's jet-black hair has grown, 
On either side her tranced form 

Forth streaming from a braid of pearl: 
The slumbrous light is rich and warm. 

And moves not on the rounded curl. 



The silk star-broider'd coverlid 

Unto her limbs itself doth mould 
Languidly ever; and, amid 

Her full black ringlets downward roU'd 
Glows forth each softly-shadow'd arm 

With bracelets of the diamond bright: 
Her constant beauty doth inform 

Stillness with love, and day with light. 

III. 

She sleeps : her breathings are not heard 
In palace chambers far apart. 



52 LOCKSLEY HALL. 

The fragrant tresses are not stirr'd 
That lie upon her charmed heart. 

She sleeps: on either hand upswells 
The gold-fringed pillow lightly prest: 

She sleeps, nor dreams, but ever dwells 
A perfect form in perfect rest. 



THE ARRIVAL. 



All precious things, discovered late, 

To those that seek them issue forth ; 
For love in sequel works with fate, 

And draws the veil from hidden worth. 
He travels far from other skies — 

His mantle glitters on the rocks — 
A fairy Prince, with joyful eyes. 

And lighter-footed than the fox. 

II. 

The bodies and the bones of those 

That strove in other days to pass, 
Are wither' d in the thorny close 

Or scatter'd branching on the grass. 
He gazes on the silent dead : 

"They perish'd in their daring deeds. '* 
This proverb flashes through his head, 

"The many fail: the one succeeds." 

Ill, 

He comes, scarce knowing what he seeks: 
He breaks the hedge : he enters there : 



AND OTHER POEMS. 53 

The color flies into his cheeks: 

He trusts to light on something fair; 

For all his life the charm did talk 
About his path, and hover near 

With words of promise in his walk, 
And whisper'd voices at his ear. 

IV. 

More close and close his footsteps wind : 

The Magic Music in his heart 
Beats quick and quicker, till he find 

The quiet chamber far apart. 
His spirit flutters like a lark, 

He stoops — to kiss her — on his knee. 
**Love, if thy tresses be so dark, 

How dark those hidden eyes must be!" 



THE REVIVAL. 
I. 

A touch, a kiss! the charm was snapt. 

There rose a noise of striking clocks. 
And feet that ran, and doors that clapt. 

And barking dogs, and crowing cocks; 
A fuller light illumined all, 

A breeze thro' all the garden swept, 
A sudden hubbub shook the hall, 

And sixty feet the fountain leapt. 



II. 



The hedge broke in, the banner blew. 
The butler drank, the steward scrawl'd. 



54 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

The fire shot up, the martin flew, 

The parrot scream'd, the peacock squall'd, 

The maid and page renew'd their strife, 
The palace bang'd, and buzz'd and clackt, 

And all the long-pent stream of life 
Dash'd downward in a cataract. 

III. 

And last with these the king awoke, 

And in his chair himself uprear'd, 
And yawn'd, and rubb'd his face, and spoke, 

*'By holy rood, a royal beard! 
(How say you) we have slept, my lords. 

My beard has grown into my lap. " 
The barons swore, with many words, 

'Twas but an after-dinner's nap. 

IV. 

**Pardy, " return'd the king, *'but still 

My joints are somewhat stiff or so. 
My lord, and shall we pass the bill 

I mention 'd half an hour ago?" 
The chancelor, sedate and vain. 

In courteous words return'd reply: 
But dallied with his golden chain. 

And, smiling, put the question by. 



THE DEPARTURE. 
I. 

And on her lover's arm she leant, 

And round her waist she felt it fold, 
And far across the hills they went 



AND OTHER POEMS. 55 

In that new world which is the old: 
Across the hills, and far away 

Beyond their utmost purple rim, 
And deep into the dying day 

The happy princess follow 'd him. 

II. 
"I'd sleep another hundred years, 

O love, for such another kiss;" 
"O wake, for ever, love," she hears, 

"O love, 'twas such as this and this." 
And o'er them many a sliding star. 

And many a merry wind was borne, 
And, stream'd thro' many a golden bar. 

The twilight melted into morn. 

III. 
"O eyes long laid in happy sleep!" 

'•O happy sleep, that lightly fled!" 
"O happy kiss, that woke thy sleep!" 

"O love, thy kiss would wake the dead!'* 
And o'er them many a flowing range 

Of vapor buoy'd the crescent-bark. 
And, rapt thro' many a rosy change, 

The twilight died into the dark. 

IV. 

"A hundred summers! can it be? 

And whither goest thou, tell me where?" 
"O seek my father's court with me. 

For there are greater wonders there." 
And o'er the hills, and far away 

Beyond their utmost purple rim. 
Beyond the night, across the day, 

Thro' all the world she follow'd him. 



56 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

MORAL. 



So, Lady Flora, take my lay, 

And if you find no moral there, 
Go, look in any glass and say, 

What moral is in being fair. 
Oh, to what uses shall we put 

The wildweed-flower that simply blows; 
And is there any moral shut 

Within the bosom of the rose? 



But any man that walks the mead. 

In bud or blade, or bloom, may find. 
According as his humors lead, 

A meaning suited to his mind. 
And liberal applications lie 

In Art like Nature, dearest friend ; 
So 'twere to cramp its use, if I 

Should hook it to some useful end. 



L'ENVOL 
I. 

You shake your head. A random string 
Your finer female sense offends. 

Well — were it not a pleasant thing 
To fall asleep with all one's friends; 

To pass with all our social ties 
To silence from the paths of men ; 




" ' What wonder if he thinks me fair. 

Locksley Hall. 



-Page 58: 



AND OTHER POEMS. 57 

And every hundred years to rise 

And learn the world, and sleep again ; 
To sleep thro' terms of mighty wars, 

And wake on science grown to more, 
On secrets of the brain, the stars, 

As wild as aught of fairy lore ; 
And all that else the years will show, 

The Poet-forms of stronger hours, 
The vast Republics that may grow, 

The Federations and the Powers ; 
Titanic forces taking birth 

In divers seasons, divers climes; 
For we are Ancients of the earth. 

And in the morning of the times. 

II. 

So sleeping, so aroused from sleep 
Thro' sunny decads new and strange 

Or gay quinqueniads would we reap 
The flower and quintessence of change. 

III. 

Ah, yet would I — and would I might ! 

So much your eyes my fancy take — 
Be still the first to leap to light 

That I might kiss those eyes awake ! 
For, am I right, or am I wrong. 

To choose your own you did not care ; 
You'd have my moral from the song. 

And I will take my pleasure there : 
And, am I right, or am I wrong, 

My fancy, ranging thro' and thro', 
To search a meaning for the song. 

Perforce will still revert to you ; 



58 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Nor finds a closer truth than this 
All-graceful head, so richly curl'd, 

And evermore a costly kiss 

The prelude to some brighter world. 

IV. 

For since the time when Adam first 

Embraced his Eve in happy hour, 
And every bird of Eden burst 

In carol, every bud to flower, 
What eyes, like thine, have waken'd hopes, 

What lips, like thine, so sweetly join'd? 
Where on the double rosebud droops 

The fulness of the pensive mind; 
Which all too dearly self-involved, 

Yet sleeps a dreamless sleep to me ; 
A sleep by kisses undissolved. 

That lets thee neither hear nor see: 
But break it. In the name of wife, 

And in the rights that name may give, 
Are clasp'd the moral of thy life, 

And that for which I care to live. 



EPILOGUE. 

So, Lady Flora, take my lay, 

And, if you find a meaning there, 
O whisper to your glass, and say, 

"What wonder if he thinks me fair?" 
What wonder I was all unwise. 

To shape the song for your delight 
Like long- tail' d birds of Paradise 

That float thro' Heaven, and cannot lig:ht? 



AND OTHER POEMS. 69 

Or old-world trains, upheld at court 
By Cupid-boys of blooming hue — 

But take it — earnest wed with sport, 
And either sacred unto you. 



AMPHION. 

My father left a park to me, 

But it is wild and barren, 
A garden too with scarce a tree, 

And waster than a warren : 
Yet say the neighbors when they call, 

It is not bad but good land, 
And in it is the germ of all 

That grows within the woodland. 

O had I lived when song was great 

In days of old Amphion, 
And ta'en my fiddle to the gate, 

Nor cared for seed or scion ! 
And had I lived when song was great, 

And legs of trees were limber. 
And ta'en my fiddle to the gate, 

And fiddled in the timber! 

'Tis said he had a tuneful tongue, 

Such happy intonation, 
Wherever he sat down and sung 

He left a small plantation; 
Wherever in a lonely grove 

He set up his forlorn pipes. 
The gouty oak began to move, 

And flounder into hornpipes. 



60 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

The mountain stirr'd its bushy crown, 

And, as tradition teaches. 
Young ashes pirouetted down 

Coquetting with young beaches ; 
And briony-vine and ivy-wreath 

Ran forward to his rhyming, 
And from the valleys underneath 

Came little copses climbing. 

The linden broke her ranks and rent 

The woodbine wreaths that bind her, 
And down the middle buzz ! she went 

With all her bees behind her: 
The poplars, in long order due, 

With cypress p5^omenaded, 
The shock-head Villows two and two 

By rivers gallopaded. 

Came wet-shod alder from the wave. 

Came yews, a dismal coterie ; 
Each pluck 'd his one foot from the grave, 

Poussetting with a sloe-tree : 
Old elms came breaking from the vine, 

The vine stream'd out to follow, 
And, sweating rosin, plump 'd the pine 

From many a cloudy hollow. 

And wasn't it a sight to see, 

When, ere his song was ended, 
Like some great landslip, tree by tree, 

The country-side descended; 
And shepherds from the mountain-eaves 

Look'd down, half-pleased, half-frighten'd. 
As dash'd about the drunken leaves 

The random sunshine lighten'd! 



AND OTHER POEMS. 61 

Oh, nature first was fresh to men, 

And wanton without measure ; 
So youthful and so flexile then, 

You moved her at your pleasure. 
Twang out, my fiddle! shake the twigs! 

And make her dance attendance; 
Blow, flute, and stir the stiff-set sprigs, 

And scirrhous roots and tendons. 

'Tis vain! in such a brassy age 

I could not move a thistle ; 
The very sparrows in the hedge 

Scarce answer to my whistle; 
Or at the most, when three-parts-sick 

With strumming and with scraping, 
A jackass heehaws from the rick. 

The passive oxen gaping. 

But what is that I hear? a sound 

Like sleepy counsel pleading; 
O Lord! — 'tis in my neighbor's ground, 

The modern Muses reading. 
They read Botanic Treatises, 

And Works on Gardening thro' there, 
And Methods of transplanting trees 

To look as if they grew there. 

The wither'd Misses! how they prose 

O'er books of travell'd seamen, 
And show you slips of all that grows 

From England to Van Diemen. 
They read in arbors dipt and cut, 

And alleys, faded places. 
By squares of tropic summer shut 

And warm'd in crystal cases. 



62 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

But these, tho' fed with careful dirt, 

Are neither green nor sappy; 
Half-conscious of the garden-squirt, 

The spindlings look unhappy. 
Better to me the meanest weed 

That blows upon the mountain, 
The vilest herb that runs to seed 

Beside its native fountain. 

And I must work thro' months of toil 

And years of cultivation, 
Upon my proper patch of soil 

To grow my own plantation. 
I'll take the showers as they fall, 

I will not vex my bosom : 
Enough if at the end of all 

A little garden blossom. 



ST. AGNES' EVE. 

Deep on the convent-roof the snows 

Are sparkling to the moon : 
My breath to heaven like vapor goes: 

May my soul follow soon ! 
The shadows of the convent-towers 

Slant down the snowy sward, 
Still creeping with the creeping hours 

That lead me to my Lord: 
Make thou my spirit pure and clear 

As are the frosty skies. 
Or this first snowdrop of the year 

That in my bosom lies. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 

As these white robes are soil'd and dark, 

To yonder shining ground; 
As this pale taper's earthly spark, 

To yonder argent round ; 
So shows my soul before the Lamb, 

My spirit before Thee ; 
So in mine earthly house I am, 

To that I hope to be. 
Break up the heavens, O Lord ! and far, 

Thro' all yon starlight keen, 
Draw me, thy bride, a glittering star, 

In raiment white and clean. 

He lifts me to the golden doors ; 

The flashes come and go ; 
All heaven bursts her starry floors. 

And strows her lights below, 
And deepens on and up! the gates 

Roll back, and far within 
For me the Heavenly Bridegroom waits, 

To make me pure of sin. 
The sabbaths of Eternity, 

One sabbath deep and wide — 
A light upon the shining sea — 

The bridegroom with his bride ! 



SIR GALAHAD. 

My good blade carves the casques of men. 
My tough lance thrusteth sure. 

My strength is as the strength of ten. 
Because my heart is pure. 

The shattering trumpet shrilleth high, 



64 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

The hard brands shiver on the steel. 
The splinter'd spear-shafts crack and fly, 

The horse and rider reel : 
They reel, they roll in clanging lists, 

And when the tide of combat stands. 
Perfume and flowers fall in showers, 

That lightly rain from ladies' hands. 

How sweet are looks that ladies bend 

On whom their favors fall ! 
For them I battle till the end, 

To save from shame and thrall: 
But all my heart is drawn above, 

My knees are bow'd in crypt and shrine: 
I never felt the kiss of love, 

Nor maiden's hand in mine. 
More bounteous aspects on me beam, 

Me mightier transports move and thrill; 
So keep I fair thro' faith and prayer 

A virgin heart in work and will. 

When down the stormy crescent goes, 

A light before me swims. 
Between dark stems the forest glows, 

I hear a noise of hymns: 
Then by some secret shrine I ride; 

I hear a voice but none are there ; 
The stalls are void, the doors are wide. 

The tapers burning fair. 
Fair gleams the snowy altar-cloth. 

The silver vessels sparkle clean. 
The shrill bell rings, the censer swings. 

And solemn chaunts resound between. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 65 

Sometimes on lonely mountain-meres 

I find a magic bark ; 
I leap on board : no helmsman steers : 

I float till all is dark. 
A gentle sound, an awful light! 

Three angels bear the holy Grail: 
With folded feet, in stoles of white, 

On sleeping wings they sail. 
Ah, blessed vision ! blood of God! 

My spirit beats her mortal bars. 
As down dark tides the glory slides, 

And star-like mingles with the stars. 

When on my goodly charger borne 

Thro' dreaming towns I go, 
The cock crows ere the Christmas morn. 

The streets are dumb with snow. 
The tempest crackles on the leads, 

And, ringing, springs from brand and mail ; 
But o'er the dark a glory spreads, 

And gilds the driving hail. 
I leave the plain, I climb the height ; 

No branchy thicket shelter yields ; 
But blessed forms in whistling storms 

Fly o'er waste fens and windy fields. 

A maiden knight — to me is given 

Such hope, I know not fear; 
I yearn to breathe the airs of heaven 

That often meets me here. 
I muse on joy that will not cease, 

Pure spaces clothed in living beams, 
Pure lilies of eternal peace, 

Whose odors haunt my dreams; 

5 Locksley Hall 



66 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

And, stricken by an angel's hand, 
This mortal armor that I wear, 

This weight and size, this heart and eyes, 
Are touch'd, and turn'd to finest air. 

The clouds are broken in the sky, 

And thro' the mountain-walls 
A rolling organ-harmony 

Swells up, and shakes and falls. 
Then move the trees, the copses nod, 

Wings flutter, voices hover clear : 
"O just and faithful knight of God! 

Ride on! the prize is near." 
So pass I hostel, hall, and grange ; 

By bridge and ford, by park and pale. 
All-arm 'd I ride, whate'er betide, 

Until I find the holy Grail. 



EDWARD GRAY. 

Sweet Emma Moreland of yonder town 

Met me walking on yonder way, 
**And have you lost your heart?" she said; 

"And are you married yet, Edward Gray?" 

Sweet Emma Moreland spoke to me : 
Bitterly weeping I turn'd away:" 

"Sweet Emma Moreland, love no more 
Can touch the heart of Edward Gray. 

"Ellen Adair she loved me well. 

Against her father's and mother's will: 

To-day I sat for an hour and wept. 
By Ellen's grave, on the windy hill. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 67 

"Shy she was, and I thought her cold; 

Thought her proud, and fled over the sea; 
Fill'd I was with folly and spite. 

When Ellen Adair was dying for me. 

"Cruel, cruel the words I said! 

Cruelly came they back to-day : 
'You're too slight and fickle,' I said, 

*To trouble the heart of Edward Gray.' 

"There I put my face in the grass — 
Whisper'd, 'Listen to my despair: 

I repent me of all I did : 

Speak a little, Ellen Adair!' 

"Then I took a pencil, and wrote 

On the mossy stone, as I lay, 
'Here lies the body of Ellen Adair; 

And here the heart of Edward Gray".' 

"Love may come, and love may go, 
And fly, like a bird, from tree to tree: 

But I will love no more, no more. 
Till Ellen Adair come back to me. 

"Bitterly wept I over the stone: 

Bitterly weeping I turn'd away: 
There lies the body of Ellen Adair! 

And there the heart of Edward Gray!" 



68 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

WILL WATERPROOF'S LYRICAL 
MONOLOGUE. 

MADE AT THE COCK. 

plump head-waiter at The Cock, 
To which I most resort, 

How goes the time? 'Tis five o'clock, 

Go fetch a pint of port : 
But let it not be such as that 

You set before chance-comers. 
But such whose father-grape grew fat 

On Lusitanian summers. 

No vain libation to the Muse, 

But may she still be kind. 
And whisper lovely words, and use 

Her influence on the mind, 
To make me write my random rhymes, 

Ere they be half- forgotten; 
Nor add and alter, many times, 

Till all be ripe and rotten. 

1 pledge her, and she comes and dips 

Her laurel in the wine, 
And lays it thrice upon my lips. 

These favor' d lips of mine; 
Until the charm have power to make 

New lifeblood warm the bosom. 
And barren commonplaces break 

In full and kindly blossom. 

I pledge her silent at the board ; 
Her gradual fingers steal 



AND OTHER POEMS. 

And touch upon the master-chord 

Of all I felt and feel. 
Old wishes, ghosts of broken plans, 

And phantom hopes assemble; 
And that child's heart within the man's 

Begins to move and tremble. 

Thro' many an hour of summer suns, 

By many pleasant ways, 
Against its fountain upward runs 

The current of my days: 
I kiss the lips I once have kiss'd; 

The gas-light wavers dimmer; 
And softly, thro' a vinous mist, 

My college friendships glimmer. 

I grow in worth, and wit, and sense, 

Unboding critic-pen. 
Or that eternal want of pence. 

Which vexes public men, 
Who hold their hands to all, and cry 

For that which all deny them — 
Who sweep the crossings, wet or dry, 

And all the world go by them. 

Ah yet, tho' all the world forsake, 

Tho' fortune clip my wings, 
I will not cramp my heart, nor take 

Half-views of men and things. 
Let Whig and Tory stir their blood; 

There must be stormy weather; 
But for some true result of good 

All parties work together. 



70 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Let there be thistles, there are grapes; 

If old things, there are new; 
Ten thousand broken lights and shapes, 

Yet glimpses of the true. 
Let raffs be rife in prose and rhyme, 

We lack not rhymes and reasons, 
As on this Whirligig of Time 

We circle with the seasons. 

This earth is rich in man and maid; 

With fair horizons bound : 
This whole wide earth of light and shade 

Comes out a perfect round. 
High over roaring Temple-bar, 

And set in Heaven's third story, 
I look at all things as they are, 

But thro* a kind of glory. 



Head- waiter, honor'd by the guest 

Half-mused, or reeling ripe. 
The pint you brought me, was the best 

That ever came from pipe. 
But tho' the port surpasses praise, 

My nerves have dealt with stiffer. 
Is there some magic in the place? 

Or do my peptics differ? 

For since I came to live and learn, 

No pint of white or red 
Had ever half the power to turn 

This wheel within my head, 
Which bears a season'd brain about. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 71 

Unsubject to confusion, 
Tho' soak'd and saturate, out and out, 
Thro' every convolution. 

For I am of a numerous house, 

With many kinsmen gay, 
Where long and largely we carouse 

As who shall say me nay: 
Each month, a birthday coming on, 

We drink defying trouble, 
Or sometimes two would meet in one. 

And then we drank it double ; 

Whether the vintage, yet unkept, 

Had relish fiery-new. 
Or elbow-deep in sawdust, slept, 

As old as Waterloo ; 
Or stow'd, when classic Canning died, 

In musty bins and chambers, 
Had cast upon its crusty side 

The gloom of ten Decembers. 

The Muse, the jolly Muse, it is! 

She answer'd to my call, 
She changes with that mood or this, 

Is all-in-all to all : 
She lit the spark within my throat, 

To make my blood run quicker. 
Used all her fiery will, and smote 

Her life into the liquor. 

And hence this halo lives about 

The waiter's hands, that reach 
To each his perfect pint of stout. 



72 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

His proper chop to each. 
He looks not like the common breed 

That with the napkin dally ; 
I think he came like Ganymede, 

From some delightful valley. 

The Cock was of a larger egg 

Than modern poultry drop, 
Stept forward on a firmer leg, 

And cramm'd a plumper crop; 
Upon an ampler dunghill trod, 

Crow'd lustier late and early, 
Sipt wine from silver, praising God, 

And raked in golden barley. 

A private life was all his joy. 

Till in a court he saw 
A something-pottle-bodied boy 

That knuckled at the taw: 
He stoop 'd and clutch 'd him, fair and good, 

Flew over roof and casement: 
His brothers of the weather stood 

Stock-still for sheer amazement. 

But he, by farmstead, thorpe, and spire. 

And follow'd with acclaims, 
A sign to many a staring shire 

Came crowing over Thames. 
Right down by smoky Paul's they bore, 

Till, where the street grows straiter. 
One fix'd forever at the door, 

And one became head- waiter. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 73 

But whither would my fancy go? 

How out of place she makes 
The violet of a legend blow 

Among the chops and steaks! 
'Tis but a steward of the can, 

One shade more plump than common; 
As just and mere a serving-man 

As any born of woman. 

I ranged too high : what draws me down 

Into the common day? 
Is it the weight of that half-crown, 

Which I shall have to pay? 
For something duller than at first, 

Nor wholly comfortable, 
I sit, my empty glass reversed. 

And thrumming on the table: 

Half fearful that, with self at strife, 

I take myself to task ; 
Lest of the fulness of my life 

I leave an empty flask : 
For I had hope, by something rare, 

To prove myself a poet : 
But, while I plan and plan, my hair 

Is gray before I know it. 

So fares it since the years began, 

Till they be gather'd up; 
The truth, that flies the flowing can, 

Will haunt the vacant cup : 
And others' follies teach us not. 

Nor much their wisdom teaches; 
And most, of sterling worth, is what 

Our own experience preaches. 

6 



74 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Ah, let the rusty theme alone ! 

We know not what we know. 
But for my pleasant hour, 'tis gone; 

'Tis gone, and let it go. 
'Tis gone: a thousand such have slipt 

Away from my embraces, 
And fall'n into the dusty crypt 

Of darken 'd forms and faces. 

Go, therefore, thou ! thy betters went 

Long since, and came no more ; 
With peals of genial clamor sent 

From many a tavern-door. 
With twisted quirks and happy hits, 

From misty men of letters ; 
The tavern-hours of mighty wits — 

Thine elders and thy betters. 

Hours, when the Poet's words and looks 

Had yet their native glow: 
Nor yet the fear of little books 

Had made him talk for show ; 
But, all his vast heart sherris-warm'd. 

He flash'd his random speeches. 
Ere days, that deal in ana, swarm 'd 

His literary leeches. 

So mix forever with the past. 
Like all good things on earth ! 

For should I prize thee, couldst thou last, 
At half thy real worth? 

I hold it good, good things should pass : 
With time I will not quarrel : 



AND OTHER POEMS. 75 

It is but yonder empty glass 

That makes me mauldlin-moral. 



Head-waiter of the chop-house here, 

To which I most resort, 
I too must part: I hold thee dear 

For this good pint of port. 
For this, thou shalt from all things suck 

Marrow of mirth and laughter; 
And wheresoe'er thou move, good luck 

Shall fling her old shoe after. 

But thou wilt never move from hence, 

The sphere thy fate allots: 
Thy latter days increased with pence 

Go down among the pots : 
Thou battenest by the greasy gleam 

In haunts of hungry sinners, 
Old boxes, larded with the steam 

Of thirty thousand dinners. 

We fret, we fume, would shift our skins, 

Would quarrel with our lot ; 
Thy care is, under polish 'd tins. 

To serve the hot-and-hot; 
To come and go, and come again, 

Returning like the pewit, 
And watch'd by silent gentlemen, 

That trifle with the cruet. 

Live long, ere from thy topmost head 
The thick-set hazel dies; 



76 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Long, ere the hateful crow shall tread 

The corners of thine eyes: 
Live long, nor feel in head or chest 

Our changeful equinoxes, 
Till mellow Death, like some late guest, 

Shall call thee from the boxes. 

But when he calls, and thou shalt cease 

To pace the gritted floor, 
And, laying down an unctuous lease 

Of life, shall earn no more; 
No carved cross-bones, the types of Death, 

Shall show thee past to Heaven: 
But carved cross-pipes, and, underneath, 

A pint-pot neatly graven. 



LADY CLARE. 

It was the time when lilies blow, 
And clouds are highest up in air, 

Lord Ronald brought a lily-white doe 
To give his cousin, Lady Clare. 

I trow they did not part in scorn: 
Lovers long-betroth 'd were they: 

They two will wed the morrow morn : 
God's blessing on the day! 

"He does not love me for my birth, 
Nor for my lands so broad and fair; 

He loves me for my own true worth, 
And that is well," said Lady Clare. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 77 

In there came old Alice the nurse, 

Said, "Who was this that went from thee? 

**It was my cousin," said Lady Clare, 
"To-morrow he weds with me." 

**0 God be thank'd!" said Alice the nurse, 
"That all comes round so just and fair: 

Lord Ronald is heir of all your lands, 
And you are not the Lady Clare. ' * 

"Are ye out of your mind, my nurse, my 
nurse?" 

Said Lady Clare, "that ye speak so wild?" 
"As God's above," said Alice the nurse, 

"I speak the truth: you are my child. 

"The old Earl's daughter died at my breast; 

I speak the truth, as I live by bread ! 
I buried her like my own sweet child. 

And put my child in her stead." 

"Falsely, falsely have ye done, 

O mother," she said, "if this be true, 

To keep the best man under the sun 
So many years from his due. ' ' 

"Nay now, my child," said Alice the nurse, 
"But keep the secret for your life, 

And all you have will be Lord Ronald's, 
When you are man and wife. ' ' 

"If I'm a beggar born," she said, 

"I will speak out, for I dare not lie. ^ 

Pull off, pull off, the brooch of gold. 
And fling the diamond necklace by.'" 



78 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

"Nay now, my child," said Alice the nurse, 
*'But keep the secret all ye can." 

She said, "Not so: but I will know 
If there be any faith in man." 

** Nay now, what faith?" said Alice the nurse, 
"The man will cleave unto his right." 

"And he shall have it," the lady replied, 
"Tho' I should die to-night." 

"Yet give one kiss to your mother dear! 

Alas, my child, I sinn'd for thee." 
"O mother, mother, mother," she said, 

"So strange it seems to me. 

"Yet here's a kiss for my mother dear. 

My mother dear, if this be so. 
And lay your hand upon my head. 

And bless me, mother, ere I go." 

She clad herself in a russet gown. 
She was no longer Lady Clare : 

She went by dale, and she went by down. 
With a single rose in her hair. 

The lily-white doe Lord Ronald had brought 

Leapt up from where she lay, 
Dropt her head in the maiden's hand. 

And follow'd her all the way. 

Down stept Lord Ronald from his tower: 
"O Lady Clare, you shame your worth! 

Why come you drest like a village maid, 
That are the flower of the earth?" 



AND OTHER POEMS. 79 

*'If I come drest like a village maid, 

I am but as my fortunes are : 
I am beggar born," she said, 

"And not the Lady Clare." 

*'Play me no tricks," said Lord Ronald, 
*'For I am yours in word and in deed. 

Play me no tricks, * ' said Lord Ronald, 
"Your riddle is hard to read. " 

O and proudly stood she up! 

Her heart within her did not fail : 
She look'd into Lord Ronald's eyes. 

And told him all her nurse's tale. 

He laugh'd a laugh of merry scorn: 

He turn'd and kiss'd her where she stood 

**If you are not the heiress born, 

And I," said he, "the next in blood — 

**If you are not the heiress born. 
And I," said he, "the lawful heir. 

We two will wed to-morrow morn, 
And you shall still be Lady Clare. ' ' 



THE CAPTAIN. 

A LEGEND OF THE NAVY. 

He that only rules by terror 

Doeth grievous wrong. 
Deep as Hell I count his error. 

Let him hear my song. 
Brave the Captain was: the seamen 



80 LOCKSLEY HALL, 



Made a gallant crew, 
Gallant sons of English freemen, 

Sailors bold and true. 
But they hated his oppression, 

Stern he was and rash ; 
So for every light transgression 

Doom'd them to the lash. 
Day by day more harsh and cruel 

Seem'd the Captain's mood. 
Secret wrath like smother'd fuel 

Burnt in each man's blood. 
Yet he hoped to purchase glory, 

Hoped to make the name 
Of his vessel great in story, 

Wheresoe'er he came. 
So they past by capes and islands, 

Many a harbor-mouth, 
Sailing under palmy highlands 

Far within the South. 
On a day when they were going 

O'er the lone expanse, 
In the north, her canvas flowing, 

Rose a ship of France. 
Then the Captain's color heighten'd, 

Joyful came his speech: 
But a cloudy gladness lighten'd 

In the eyes of each. 
** Chase," he said: the ship flew forward, 

And the wind did blow ; 
Stately, lightly, went she Norward, 

Till she near'd the foe. 
Then they look'd at him they hated, 

Had what they desired : 
Mute with folded arms they waited — 



AND OTHER POEMS. 81 

Not a gun was fired. 
But they heard the foeman's thunder 

Roaring out their doom ; 
All the air was torn in sunder, 

Crashing went the boom, 
Spars were splinter'd, decks were shatter'd, 

Bullets fell like rain ; 
Over mast and deck were scatter'd 

Blood and brains of men. 
Spars were splinter'd; decks were broken: 

Every mother's son — 
Down they dropt — no v/ord was spoken — 

Each beside his gun. 
On the decks as they were lying. 

Were their faces grim. 
In their blood, as they lay dying, 

Did they smile on him. 
Those, in whom he had reliance 

For his noble name, 
With one smile of still defiance 

Sold him unto shame. 
Shame and wrath his heart confounded, 

Pale he turn'd and red, 
Till himself was deadly wounded 

Falling on the dead. 
Dismal error! fearful slaughter! 

Years have wander'd by, 
Side by side beneath the water 

Crew and Captain lie ; 
There the sunlit ocean tosses 

O'er them mouldering, 
And the lonely seabird crosses 

With one waft of the wing. 

6 Locksley Hall 



82 LOCKSLEY HALL, 



THE LORD OF BURLEIGH. 

In her ear he whispers gaily, 

"If my heart by signs can tell, 
Maiden, I have watch'd thee daily, 

And I think thou lov'st me well." 
She replies, in accents fainter, 

*' There is none I love like thee." 
He is but a landscape-painter, 

And a village maiden she. 
He to lips, that fondly falter. 

Presses his without reproof: 
Leads her to the village altar, 

And they leave her father's roof. 
**I can make no marriage present: 

Little can I give my wife. 
Love will make our cottage pleasant, 

And I love thee more than life." 
They by parks and lodges going 

See the lordly castles stand: 
Summer woods, about them blowing, 

Made a murmur in the land. 
From deep thought himself he rouses 

Says to her that loves him well, 
**Let us see these handsome houses 

Where the wealthy nobles dwell." 
So she goes by him attended. 

Hears him lovingly converse, 
Sees whatever fair and splendid 

Lay betwixt his home and hers; 
Parks with oak and chestnut shady, 

Parks and order'd gardens great, 
Ancient homes of lord and lady, 



AND OTHER POEMS. 

Built for pleasure and for state. 
All he shows her makes him dearer: 

Evermore she seems to gaze 
On that cottage growing nearer, 

Where they twain will spend their days. 
O but she will love him truly! 

He shall have a cheerful home; 
She will order all things duly, 

When beneath his roof they come. 
Thus her heart rejoices greatly. 

Till a gateway she discerns 
With armorial bearings stately, 

And beneath the gate she turns ; 
Sees a mansion more majestic 

Than all those she saw before: 
Many a gallant gay domestic 

Bows before him at the door. 
And they speak in gentle murmur, 

AVhen they answer to his call, 
While he treads with footstep firmer, 

Leading on from hall to hall. 
And, while now she wonders blindly. 

Nor the meaning can divine, 
Proudly turns he round and kindly, 

*'A11 of this is mine and thine." 
Here he lives in state and bounty. 

Lord of Burleigh, fair and free. 
Not a lord in all the county 

Is so great a lord as he. 
All at once the color flushes 

Her sweet face from brow to chin : 
As it were with shame she blushes, 

And her spirit changed within. 
Then her countenance all over 



84 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Pale again as death did prove: 
But he clasp'd her like a lover, 

And he cheer'd her soul with love. 
So she strove against her weakness, 

Tho' at times her spirit sank : 
Shaped her heart with woman's meekness 

To all duties of her rank: 
And a gentle consort made he, 

And her gentle mind was such 
That she grew a noble lady, 

And the people loved her much. 
But a trouble weigh'd upon her, 

And perplex'd her, night and morn, 
With the burthen of an honor 

Unto which she was not born. 
Faint she grew, and ever fainter, 

And she murmur 'd, *'0h, that he 
Were once more that landscape-painter 

Which did win my heart from me!" 
So she droop'd and droop'd before him. 

Fading slowly from his side: 
Three fair children first she bore him, 

Then before her time she died. 
Weeping, weeping late and early, 

Walking up and pacing down. 
Deeply mourn'd the Lord of Burleigh, 

Burleigh-house by Stamford-town. 
And he came to look upon her. 

And he look'd at her and said, 
"Bring the dress and put it on her. 

That she wore when she was wed. " 
Then her people, softly treading, 

Bore to earth her body, drest 
In the dress that she was wed in, 

That her spirit might have rest. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 85 



THE VOYAGE. 



We left behind the painted buoy 

That tosses at the harbor- mouth; 
And madly danced our hearts with joy, 

As fast we fleeted to the South : 
How fresh was every sigfht and sound 

On open main or winding shore ! 
We knew the merry world was round, 

And we might sail for evermore. 



Warm broke the breeze against the brow, 

Dry sang the tackle, sang the sail: 
The Lady's-head upon the proAv 

Caught the shrill salt, and sheer'd the gale. 
The broad seas swell'd to meet the keel, 

And swept behind ; so quick the run, 
We felt the good ship shake and reel, 

We seem'd to sail into the Sun! 

III. 

How oft we saw the Sun retire. 

And burn the threshold of the night, 

Fall from his Ocean-lane of fire, 

And sleep beneath his pillar'd light! 

How oft the purple-skirted robe 

Of twilight slowly downward drawn, 

As thro' the slumber of the globe 
Again we dash'd into the dawn! 



86 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

IV. 

New stars all night above the brim 

Of waters lighten'd into view; 
They climb'd as quickly, for the rim 

Changed every moment as we flew. 
Far ran the naked moon across 

The houseless ocean's heaving field, 
Or flying shone, the silver boss 

Of her own halo's dusky shield; 



The peaky islet shifted shapes, 

High towns on hills were dimly seen, 
We past long lines of Northern capes 

And dewy Northern meadows green. 
We came to warmer waves, and deep 

Across the boundless east we drove, 
Where those long swells of breaker sweep 

The nutmeg rocks and isles of clove. 

VI. 

By peaks that flamed, or, all in shade, 

Gloom'd the low coast and quivering brine 
With ashy rains, that spreading made 

Fantastic plume or sable pine ; 
By sands and steaming flats, and floods 

Of mighty mouth, we scudded fast, 
And hills and scarlet-mingled woods 

Glow'd for a moment as we past. 

VII. 

O hundred shores of happy climes, 
How swiftly stream 'd ye by the bark! 



AND OTHER POEMS. 87 

At times the whole sea burn'd, at times 
With wakes of fire we tore the dark ; 

At times a carven craft would shoot 
From havens hid in fairy bowers, 

With naked limbs and flowers and fruit, 
But we nor paused for fruit nor flowers. 

VIII. 

For one fair Vision ever fled 

Down the waste waters day and night, 
And still we follow 'd where she led, 

In hope to gain upon her flight. 
Her face was evermore unseen. 

And fixt upon the far sea-line; 
But each man murmur 'd, "O my Queen, 

I follow till I make thee mine.** 

IX. 

And now we lost her, now she gleam 'd 

Like Fancy made of golden air, 
Now nearer to the prow she seem'd 

Like Virtue firm, like Knowledge fair, 
Now high on waves that idly burst 

Like Heavenly Hope she crown'd the sea, 
And now, the bloodless point reversed, 

She bore the blade of Liberty. 

X. 

And only one among us — him 

We pleased not — he was seldom pleased: 
He saw not far : his eyes were dim : 
' But ours he swore were all diseased. 
"A ship of fools," he shriek 'd in spite, 
"A ship of fools," he sneer'd and wept. 



1 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

And overboard one stormy night 
He cast his body, and on we swept. 

XI. 

And never sail of ours was furl'd, 

Nor anchor dropt at eve or morn ; 
We lov'd the glories of the world, 

But laws of nature were our scorn. 
For blasts would rise and rave and cease, 

But whence were those that drove the sail 
Across the whirlwind's heart of peace, 

And to and thro' the counter gale? 

XII. 

Again to colder climes we came, 

For still we follow 'd where she led: 
Now mate is blind and captain lame, 

And half the crew are sick or dead, 
But, blind or lame or sick or sound, 

We follow that which flies before: 
We know the merry world is round, 

And we may sail for evermore. 



SIR LAUNCELOT AND QUEEN 
GUINEVERE. 

A FRAGMENT. 

Like souls that balance joy and pain, 
With tears and smiles from heaven again 
The maiden Spring upon the plain 
Came in a sun-lit fall of rain. 

In crystal vapor everywhere 



AND OTHER POEMS. 89 

Blue isles of heaven laugh'd between, 
And far, in forest-deeps unseen, 
The topmost elm-tree gather'd green 
From draughts of balmy air. 

Sometimes the linnet piped his song: 
Sometimes the throstle whistled strong: 
Sometimes the sparhawk, wheel'd along, 
Hush'd all the groves from fear of wrong: 

By grassy capes with fuller sound 
In curves the yellowing river ran. 
And drooping chestnut-buds began 
To spread into the perfect fan, 

Above the teeming groun'd. 

Then, in the boyhood of the year. 
Sir Launcelot and Queen Guinevere 
Rode thro' the coverts of the deer. 
With blissful treble ringing clear. 

She seem'd a part of joyous Spring: 
A gown of grass-green silk she wore, 
Buckled with golden clasps before ; 
A light-green tuft of plumes she bore 

Closed in a golden ring. 

Now on some twisted ivy-net, 

Now by some tinkling rivulet. 

In mosses mixt with violet 

Her cream- white mule his pastern set: 

And fleeter now she skimm'd the plains 
Than she whose elfin prancer springs 
By night to eery warblings, 
When all the glimmering moorland rings 

With jingling bridle-reins. 



90 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

As she fled fast thro' sun and shade, 
The happy winds upon her play'd, 
Blowing the ringlet from the braid : 
She look'd so lovely, as she sway'd 

The rein with dainty finger-tips, 
A man had given all other bliss, 
And all his worldly worth for this, 
To waste his whole heart in one kiss 

Upon her perfect lips. 



A FAREWELL. 

Flow down, cold rivulet, to the sea. 
Thy tribute wave deliver: 

No more by thee my steps shall be. 
Forever and forever. 

Flow, softly flow, by lawn and lea, 

A rivulet than a river : 
No where by thee my steps shall be. 

Forever and forever. 

But here will sigh thine alder tree, 
And here thine aspen shiver; 

And here by thee will hum the bee. 
Forever and forever. 

A thousand suns will stream on thee, 
A thousand moons will quiver; 

But not by thee my steps shall be, 
Forever and forever. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 91 



THE BEGGAR MAID. 

Her arms across her breast she laid; 

She was more fair than words can say: 
Bare- footed came the beggar maid 

Before the king Cophetua. 
In robe and crown the king stept down, 

To meet and greet her on her way; 
*'It is no wonder," said the lords, 

"She is more beautiful than day." 

As shines the moon in clouded skies, 

She in her poor attire was seen: 
One praised her ancles, one her eyes. 

One her dark hair and lovesome mien. 
So sweet a face, such angel grace, 

In all that land had never been: 
Cophetua sware a royal oath : 

"This beggar maid shall be ray queen!' 



THE EAGLE. 

FRAGMENT. 

He clasps the crag with crooked hands; 
Close to the sun in lonely lands, 
Ring'd with the azure world, he stands. 

The wrinkled sea beneath him crawls ; 
He watches from his mountain walls. 
And like a thunderbolt he falls. 



92 LOCKSLEY HALL, 



MOVE EASTWARD, HAPPY EARTH, 
AND LEAVE." 

Move eastward, happy earth, and leave 

Yon orange sunset waning slow : 
From fringes of the faded eve, 

Oh, happy planet, eastward go; 
Till over thy dark shoulder glow 

Thy silver sister-world, and rise 
To glass herself in dewy eyes 

That watch me from the glen below. 

Ah, bear me with thee, smoothly borne, 
Dip forward under starry light, 

And move me to my marriage-morn, 
And round again to happy night. 



''COME NOT, WHEN I AM DEAD." 

Come not, when I am dead. 

To drop thy foolish tears upon my grave, 
To trample round my fallen head, 

And vex the unhappy dust thou wouldst 
not save. 
There let the wind sweep and the plover cry; 

But thou, go by. 
Child, if it were thine error or thy crime 

I care no longer, being all unblest: 
Wed whom thou wilt, but I am sick of Time, 

And I desire to rest. 
Pass on, weak heart, and leave me where I 
lie: 
Go by, go by. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 93 



THE LETTERS. 



Still on the tower stood the vane, 

A black yew g-loom'd the stagnant air, 
I peer'd athwart the chancel pane 

And saw the altar cold and bare. 
A clog of lead was round my feet, 

A band of pain across my brow; 
*'Cold altar, Heaven and earth shall meet 

Before you hear my marriage vow." 

II. 

I turn'd and humm'd a bitter song 

That mock'd the wholesome human heart, 
And then we met in wrath and wrong, 

We met, but only meant to part 
Full cold my greeting was and dry ; 

She faintly smiled, she hardly moved; 
I saw with half-unconscious eye 

She wore the colors I approved. 

III. 

She took the little ivory chest, 

With half a sigh she turn'd the key, 
Then raised her head with lips comprest, 

And gave my letters back to me. 
And gave the trinkets and the rings. 

My gifts, when gifts of mine could please ; 
As looks a father on the things 

Of his dead son, I look'd on these. 



94 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

IV. 

She told me all her friends had said; 

I raged against the public liar; 
She talk'd as if her love were dead, 

But in my words were seeds of fire. 
"No more of love; your sex is known 

I never will be twice deceived. 
Henceforth I trust the man alone, 

The woman cannot be believed. 

V. 

"Thro' slander, meanest spawn of Hell — 

And women's slander is the worst, 
And you, whom once I lov'd so well. 

Thro' you, my life will be accurst." 
I spoke with heart, and heat and force, 

I shook her breast with vague alarms — 
Like torrents from a mountain source 

We rush'd into each other's arms. 

VI. 

We parted: sweetly gleam 'd the stars, 

And sweet the vapor-braided blue, 
Low breezes fann'd the belfry bars, 

As homeward by the church I drew. 
The very graves appear 'd to smile, 

So fresh they rose in shadow'd swells: 
"Dark porch," I said, "and silent aisle, 

There comes a sound of marriage bells." 



AND OTHER POEMS. 95 



THE VISION OF SIN. 



I had a vision when the night was late : 
A youth came riding toward a palace-gate. 
He rode a horse with wings, that would have 

flown, 
But that his heavy rider kept him down. 
And from the palace came a child of sin. 
And took him by the curls, and led him in, 
Where sat a company with heated eyes, 
Expecting when a fountain should arise : 
A sleepy light upon their brows and lips — 
As when the sun, a crescent of eclipse, 
Dreams over lake and lawn, and isles and 

capes — 
Suffused them, sitting, lying, languid shapes. 
By heaps of gourds, and skins of wine, and 

piles of grapes. 

II. 

Then methought I heard a mellow sound. 
Gathering up from all the lower ground ; 
Narrowing in to where they sat assembled 
Low voluptuous music winding trembled, 
Wov'n in circles: they that heard it sigh'd, 
Panted hand-in-hand with faces pale. 
Swung themselves, and in low tones replied; 
Till the fountain spouted, showering wide 
Sleet of diamond-drift and pearly hail ; 
Then the music touch'd the gates and died; 
Rose aofain from where it seem'd to fail. 



96 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Storm'd in orbs of song, a growing gale; 
Till thronging in and in, to where they waited, 
As 'twere a hundred-throated nightingale. 
The strong tempestous treble throbb'd and 

palpitated ; 
Ran into its giddiest whirl of sound. 
Caught the sparkles, and in circles. 
Purple gauzes, golden hazes, liquid mazes, 
Flung the torrent rainbow round: 
Then they started from their places. 
Moved with violence, changed in hue, 
Caught each other with wild grimaces. 
Half-invisible to the view. 
Wheeling with precipitate paces 
To the melody, till they flew. 
Hair, and eyes, and limbs, and faces, 
Twisted hard in fierce embraces, 
Like to Furies, like to Graces, 
Dash'd together in blinding dew: 
Till, kill'd with some luxurious agony, 
The nerve-dissolving melody 
Flutter'd headlong from the sky. 

III. 

And then I look'd up toward a mountain-tract, 
That girt the region with high cliff and lawn : 
I saw that every morning, far withdrawn 
Beyond the darkness and the cataract, 
God made Himself an awful rose of dawn. 
Unheeded : and detaching, fold by fold. 
From those still heights, and, slowly drawing 

near, 
A vapor heavy, hueless, formless, cold. 
Came floating on for many a month and year, 



AND OTHER POEMS. 97 

Unheeded : and I thought I Vv-ould have spoken, 
And warn'd that madman ere it grew too late: 
But, as in dreams, I could not. Mine was 

broken, 
When that cold vapor touch 'd the palace gate, 
And link'd again. I saw within my head 
A gray and gap-tooth'd man as lean as death, 
Who slowly rode across a wither'd heath, 
And lighted at a ruin'd inn, and said: 

IV. 

** Wrinkled ostler, grim and thin 
Here is custom come your way ; 

Take my brute, and lead him in, 
Stuff his ribs with mouldy hay. 

"Bitter barmaid, waning fast 
See that sheets are on my bed ; 

What! the flower of life is past: 
It is long before you wed. 

** Slip-shod waiter, lank and sour 
At the Dragon on the heath! 

Let us have a quiet hour, 

Let us hob-and-nob with Death. 

"I am old, but let me drink; 

Bring me spices, bring me wine; 
I remember, when I think. 

That my youth was half-divine. 

**Wine is good for shrivel'd lips. 
When a blanket wraps the day. 

When the rotten woodland drips. 
And the leaf is stamp'd in clay. 

7 LocksleyHall 



LOCKSLEY HALL, 

"Sit thee dov/n, and have no shame, 
Cheek by jowl, and knee by knee: 

What care I for any name? 
What for order or degree? 

"Let me screw thee up a peg: 

Let me loose thy tongue with wine: 

Callest thou that thing a leg? 

Which is thinnest? thine or mine? 

*'Thou shalt not be vSaved by works: 

Thou hast been a sinner too: 
Ruin'd trunks on wither'd forks, 

Empty scarecrows, I and you! 

"Fill the cup, and fill the can: 
Have a rouse before the morn : 

Every moment dies a man, 
Every moment one is born. 

"We are men of ruin'd blood; 

Therefore comes it we are wise. 
Fish are we that love the mud. 

Rising to no fancy-flies. 

"Name and fame! to fly sublime 

Thro* the courts, the camps, the schools, 

Is to be the ball of Time, 

Bandied by the hands of fools. 

"Friendship! — to be two in one — 

Let the canting liar pack ! 
Well I know, when I am gone, 

How she mouths behind my back. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 99 

"Virtue! — to be good and just — 
Every heart, when sifted well, 

Is a clot of warmer dust, 

Mix'd with cunning sparks of hell. 

"O! we two as well can look 

Whited thought and cleanly life 

As the priest, above his book 
Leering at his neighbor's wife. 

"Fill the cup, and fill the can: 
Have a rouse before the morn: 

Every moment dies a man, 
Every moment one is born. 

"Drink, and let the parties rave: ^ 
They are fill'd with idle spleen; 

Rising, falling, like a wave, 

For they know not what they mean. 

"He that roars for liberty 

Faster binds a tyrant's power; 

And the tyrant's cruel glee 
Forces on the freer hour. 

"Fill the can, and fill the cup: 

All the windy ways of men 
Are but dust that rises up, 

And is lightly laid again. 

"Greet her with applausive breath, 
Freedom, gaily doth she tread ; 

In her right a civic wreath. 
In her left a human head. 

Wire. 



100 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

"No, I love not what is new; 

She is of an ancient house: 
And I think we know the hue 

Of that cap upon her brows. 

"Let her go! her thirst she slakes 
Where the bloody conduit runs, 

Then her sweetest meal she makes 
On the first-born of her sons. 

•'Drink to lofty hopes that cool — 
Visions of a perfect State : 

Drink we, last, the public fool. 
Frantic love and frantic hate. 

"Chant me now some wicked stave, 
Till thy drooping courage rise. 

And the glow-worm of the grave 
Glimmer in thy rheumy eyes. 

"Fear not thou to loose thy tongue; 

Set thy hoary fancies free ; 
What is loathsome to the young 

Savors well to thee and me. 

"Change, reverting to the years. 
When thy nerves could understand 

What there is in loving tears, 

And the warmth of hand in hand. 

"Tell me tales of thy first love — 
April hopes, the fools of chance; 

Till the graves begin to move, 
And the dead begin to dance. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 101 

**Fill the can, and fill the cup: 

All the windy ways of men 
Are but dust that rises up, 

And is lightly laid again. 

'* Trooping from their mouldy dens 
The chap-fallen circle spreads: 

Welcome, fellow-citizens, 

Hollow hearts and empty heads ! 

"You are bones, and what of that? 

Every face, however full, 
Padded round with flesh and fat, 

Is but model'd on a skull. 

"Death is king, and Vivat Rex! 

Tread a measure on the stones, 
Madam — if I know your sex. 

From the fashion of your bones. 

"No, I cannot praise the fire 
In your eye — nor yet your lip : 

All the more do I admire 

Joints of cunning workmanship. 

"Lo! God's likeness — the ground-plan — 
Neither model'd, glazed, nor framed; 

Buss me, thou rough sketch of man, 
Far too naked to be shamed! 

"Drink to Fortune, drink to Chance, 
While we keep a little breath ! 

Drink to heavy Ignorance! 

Hob-and-nob with brother Death! 



102 LOCKSLEY HALL. 

*'Thou art mazed, the night is long. 
And the longer night is near: 

What ! I am not all as wrong- 
As a bitter jest is dear. 

**Youthfu] hopes, by scores, to all, 
When the locks are crisp and curl'd; 

Unto me my maudlin gall 

And my mockeries of the world. 

"Fill the cup, and fill the can: 
Mingle madness, mJngle scorn! 

Dregs of life, and lees of man: 
Yet we will not die forlorn." 

V. 

The voice grew faint : there came a further 

change : 
Once more uprose the mystic mountain-range : 
Below were men and horses pierced with worms 
And slowly quickening into lower forms: 
By shards and scurf, of salt and scum of dross. 
Old plash of rains,and refuse patch'd with moss. 
Then some one spake: "Behold! it was a crime 
Of sense avenged by sense that wore with 

time." 
Another said: "The crime of sense became 
The crime of malice, and is equal blame." 
And one: "He had not wholly quench'd his 

power; 
A little grain of conscience made him sour." 
At last I heard a voice upon the slope 
Cry to the summit, "Is there any hope?" 
To which an answer peal'd from that high land, 



AND OTHER POEMS. 103 

But in a tongue no man could understand: 
And on the glimmering limit far withdrawn 
God made Himself an awful rose of dawn. 



TO 



AFTER READING A LIFE AND LETTERS. 

"Cursed he be that moves my bones." 

— Shakespeare's Epitaph. 

You might have won the Poet's name, 
If such be w^orth the winning now, 
And gain'd a laurel for your brow 

Of sounder leaf than I can claim ; 

But you have made the wiser choice, 
A life that moves to gracious ends 
Thro' troops of unrecording friends, 

A deedful life, a silent voice: 

And you have miss'd the irreverent doom 
Of those that wear the Poet's crown: 
Hereafter, neither knave nor clown 

Shall hold their orgies at your tomb. 

For now the Poet cannot die, 
Nor leave his music as of old. 
But round him ere he scarce be cold 

Begins the scandal and the cry: 

** Proclaim the faults he would not show: 
Break lock and seal : betray the trust : 



104 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Keep nothing sacred : 'tis but just 
The many-headed beast should know." 

Ah shameless! for he did but sing 

A song that pleased us from its worth ; 
No public life was his on earth, 

No blazon'd statesman he, nor king. 

He gave the people of his best: 

His worst he kept, his best he gave. 

My Shakespeare's curse on clown and knave 

Who will not let his ashes rest! 

Who make it seem more sweet to be 
The little life of bank and brier, 
The bird that pipes his lone desire 

And dies unheard within his tree, 

Than he that warbles long and loud 
And drops at Glory's temple-gates, 
For whom the carrion vulture waits 

To tear his heart before the crowd! 



TO E. L., ON HIS TRAVELS IN GREECE. 

Illyrian woodlands, echoing falls 
Of water, sheets of summer glass, 
The long divine Peneian pass. 

The vast Akrokeraunian walls, 

Tomohrit, Athos, all things fair, 
With such a pencil, such a pen, 



AND OTHER POEMS. 105 

You shadow forth to distant men, 
I read and felt that I was there: 

And trust me while I turn'd the page, 
And track 'd you still on classic ground, 
I grew in gladness till I found 

My spirits in the golden age. 

For me the torrent ever pour'd 

And glisten 'd — here and there alone 

The broad-limb'd Gods at random thrown 

By fountain-urns; — and Naiads oar'd 

A glimmering shoulder under gloom 

Of cavern pillars; on the swell 

The silver lily heaved and fell ; 
And many a slope was rich in bloom 

From him that on the mountain lea 
By dancing rivulets fed his flocks 
To him who sat upon the rocks. 

And fluted to the morning sea. 



BREAK, BREAK, BREAK. 

Break, break, break. 

On thy cold gray stones, O Sea! 
And I would that my tongue could utter 

The thoughts that arise in me. 

O well for the fisherman's boy, 

That he shouts with his sister at play! 

8 



106 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

O well for the sailor lad, 
That he sings in his boat on the bay ! 

And the stately ships go on 
To their haven under the hill ; 

But O for the touch of a vanish'd hand, 
And the sound of a voice that is still! 

Break, break, break 

At the foot of the crags, O Sea ! 
But the tender grace of a day that is dead 

Will never come back to me. 



THE POET'S SONG. 

The rain had fallen, the Poet arose. 

He pass'd by the town and out of the street, 
A light wind blew from the gates of the sun. 

And waves of shadow went over the wheat, 
And he sat him down in a lonely place, 

And chanted a melody loud and sweet, 
That made the wild-swan pause in her cloud, 

And the lark drop down at his feet. 

The swallow stopt as he hunted the bee, 

The snake slipt under a spray. 
The wild hawk stood with the down on his 
beak, 

And stared, with his foot on the prey. 
And the nightingale thought, "I have sung 
many songs, 

But never a one so gay, 
For he sings of what the world will be 

When the years have died away." 



AND OTHER POEMS. 107 



THE BROOK. 

Here, by this brook, we parted; I to the East 
And he for Italy — too late — too late: 
One whom the strong sons of the world despise ; 
For lucky rhymes to him were scrip and share, 
And mellow meters more than cent for cent; 
Nor could he understand how money breeds, 
Thought it a dead thing; yet himself could 

make 
The thing that is not as the thing that is. 

had he lived ! In our schoolbooks we say, 
Of those that held their heads above the 

crowd, 
They flourish'd then or then; but life in him 
Could scarce be said to flourish, only touch 'd 
On such a time as goes before the leaf, 
When all the wood stands in a mist of green, 
And nothing perfect: yet the brook he loved, 
For which, in branding summers of Beng-al, 
Or ev'n the sweet half-English Neilgherry air 

1 panted, seems, as I re-listen to it, 
Prattling the primrose fancies of the boy. 

To me that loved him ; for "O brook, " he says, 
*'0 babbling brook," says Edmund in his 

rhyme, 
*'Whence come you?" and the brook, why not? 

replies. 

I come from haunts of coot and hem, 

I make a sudden sally, 
And sparkle out among the fern, 

To bicker down a valley. 



108 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

By thirty hills I hurry down, 
Or slip between the ridges, 

By twenty thorps, a little town, 
And half a hundred bridges. 

Till last by Philip's farm I flow 
To join the brimming river. 

For men may come and men may go. 
But I go on for ever. 



*'Poor lad, he died at Florence, quite worn out, 
Traveling to Naples. There is Darnley bridge, 
It has more ivy; there the river; and there 
Stands Philip's farm where brook and river 
meet. 



I chatter over stony ways, 
In little sharps and trebles, 

I bubble into eddying bays, 
I babble on the pebbles. 

With man^r a curve my banks I fret 
By many a field and fallow, 

And many a fairy foreland set 
With willow-weed and mallow. 

I chatter, chatter as I flow 
To join the brimming river. 

For men may come and men may go. 
But I o^o on for ever. 



*'But Philip chatter 'd more than brook or 

bird; 
Old Philip ; all about the fields you caught 
His wear}^ daylong chirpings, like the dry 
High-elbow'd grigs that leap in summer grass. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 109 

I wind about, and in and out, 

With here a blossom sailing, 
And here and there a lusty trout, 

And here and there a grayling. 

And here and there a foamy flake 

Upon me, as I travel 
With many a silvery waterbreak 

Above the golden gravel, 

And draw them all along, and flow 

To join the brimming river, 
For men may come and men may go. 

But I go on for ever. '^ 

*'0 darling Katie Willows, his one child! 
A maiden of our century, yet most meek; 
A daughter of our meadows, yet not coarse ; 
Straight, but as lissome as a hazel wand ; 
Her eyes a bashful azure, and her hair 
In gloss and hue the chestnut, when the shell 
Divides threefold to show the fruit within. 

Sweet Katie, once I did her a good turn, 
Her and her far-oflf cousin and betrothed, 
James Willows, of one name and heart with her 
For here I came, twenty years back — the week 
Before I parted with poor Edmund ; crost 
By that old bridge which, half in ruins then,, 
Still makes a hoary eyebrow for the gleam 
Beyond it, where the waters marry — crost,, 
Whistling a random bar of Bonny Doon, 
And push'd at Philip's garden-gate. The gate,.. 
Half-parted from a weak and scolding hinge,. 
Stuck; and he clamor' d from a casement, *Run'" 
To Katie somewhere in the walks below, 



110 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

*Rtin, Katie!' Katie never ran: she moved 
To meet me, winding- under woodbine bowers, 
A little fiutter'd, wiLh lier eyelids down, 
Fresh apple-blossom, blushing for a boon. 

"What was it? less of sentiment than sense 
Had Katie; not illiterate; nor of those 
Vv^ho dabbling- in the fount of fictive tears, 
And nursed hy mealy-mouth'd philantrophies. 
Divorce the Feeling from her mate the Deed. 

*'She told me. She and James had quar- 

rel'd. Why? 
What cause of quarrel! None, she said, no 

cause ; 
James had no cause: but when I prest the 

cause, 
I learnt that James had flickering jealousies 
Which anger'd her. Who anger'd James? I 

said. 
But Katie snatch 'd her eyes at once from mine, 
And sketching with her slender pointed foot 
Borne figure like a wizard pantagram 
On garden gravel, let my query pass 
Unclaim'd, in flushing silence, till I ask'd 
If James were coming. *Coming every day,* 
She answer'd, 'ever longing to explain. 
But evermore her father came across 
With some long-winded tale, and broke him 

short ; 
And James departed vext with him and her.' 
How could I help her? 'Would I — was it 

wrong?' 
(Claspt hands and that petitionary grace 



AND OTHER POEMS. > 111 

Of sweet seventeen subdued me ere she spoke) 
*0 would I take her father for one hour, 
For one half-hour, and let him talk to me!* 
And even while she spoke, I saw where James 
Made toward us, like a wader in the surf, 
Beyond the brook, waist-deep in meadow- 
sweet. 

'*0 Katie! what I suffer 'd for your sake! 
For in I went, and call'd old Philip out 
To show the farm : full willingly he rose : 
He led me thro' the short sweet-smelling lanes 
Of his wheat-suburb, babbling as he went. 
He praised his land, his horses, his machines; 
He praised his ploughs, his cows, his hogs, his 

dogs; 
He praised his hens, his geese, his guinea-hens ; 
His pigeons, who in session on their roofs 
Approved him, bowing at their own deserts: 
Then from the plaintive mother's teat he took 
Her blind and shuddering puppies, naming 

each, 
And naming those, his friends, for whom they 

were : 
Then crost the common into Darnley chase 
To show Sir Arthur's deer. In copse and fern 
Twinkled the innumerable ear and tail. 
Then, seated on a serpent- rooted beech, 
He pointed out a pasturing colt, and said : 
*That was the four-year-old I sold the Squire.* 
And there he told a long long-winded tale 
Of how the Squire had seen the cold at grass, 
And how it was the thing his daughter wish'd. 
And how he sent the bailiff to the farm 



112 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

To learn the price, and what the price he ask'd 
And how the bailiff swore that he was mad, 
But he stood firm; and so the matter hung; 
He gave them line : and five days after that 
He met the bailiff at the Golden Fleece, 
Who then and there had offer'd something 

more, 
But he stood firm; and so the matter hung; 
He knew the man; the colt would fetch its 

price ; 
He gave them line: and how by chance at last 
(It might be May or April, he forgot. 
The last of April or the first of May) 
He found the bailiff riding by the farm, 
And, talking from the point, he drew him in. 
And there he mellow'd all his heart with ale» 
Until they closed a bargain, hand in hand. 

**Then, while I breathed in sight of haven, 
he. 
Poor fellow, could he help it? recommenced, 
And ran thro' all the coltish chronicle. 
Wild Will, Black Bess, Tantivy, Tallyho, 
Reform, White Rose, Bellerophon, the Jilt, 
Arbaces, and Phenomenon, and the rest. 
Till, not to die a listener, I arose. 
And with me Philip, talking still; and so 
We turn'd our foreheads from the falling sun. 
And following our own shadows thrice as long 
As when they follow'd us from Philip's door, 
Arrived, and found the sun of sweet content 
Re-risen in Katie's eyes, and all things well. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 113 

I steal by lawns and grassy plots, 

I slide by hazel covers ; 
I move the sweet forget-me-nots 

That grow for happy lovers. 

I slip, I slide, I gloom, I glance, 

Among my skimming swallows ; 
I make the netted sunbeam dance 

Against my sandy shallows. 

I murmur under moon and stars 

In brambly wildernesses ; 
I linger by my shingly bars ; 

I loiter round my cresses ; '' 

And out again I curve and flow 

To join the brimming river, 
For men may come and men may go, 

But I go on for ever. 



Yes^ men may come and go; and these are 

gone, 
All gone. My dearest- brother, Edmund, 

sleeps, 
Not by the well-known stream and rustic spire. 
But unfamiliar Arno, and the dome 
Of Brunelleschi ; sleeps in peace : and he. 
Poor Philip, of all his lavish waste of words 
Remains the lean P. W. on his tomb : 
I scraped the lichen from it: Katie walks 
By the long wash of Australasian seas 
Far off, and holds her head to other stars, 
And breathes in converse seasons. All are 

gone." 

So Lawrence Aylmer, seated on a stile 
In the long hedge, and rolling in his mind 



114 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Old waifs of rhyme, and bowing o'er the brook 
A tonsured head in middle age forlorn, 
Mused, and was mute. On a sudden a low 

breath 
Of tender air made tremble in the hedge 
The fragile bindweed-bells and briony rings; 
And he look'd up. There stood a maiden 

near, 
Waiting to pass. In much amaze he stared 
On eyes a bashful azure, and on hair 
In gloss and hue the chestnut, when the shell 
Divides threefold to show the fruit within : 
Then, wondering, ask'd her "Are you from the 

farm?" 
*'Yes," answer'd she. *'Pray stay a little: 

pardon me; 
What do they call you?" "Katie." **That 

were strange. 
What surname?" ''Willows." ''No!" "That 

is my name." 
"Indeed!" and here he look'd so self-perplext, 
That Katie laugh'd, and laughing blush 'd, till 

he 
Laugh'd also, but as one before he wakes, 
Who feels a glimmering strangeness in his 

dream. 
Then looking at her; "Too happy, fresh and 

fair. 
Too fresh and fair in our sad world's best 

bloom, 
To be the ghost of one who bore your name 
About these meadows, twenty years ago." 



AND OTHER POEMS. 115 

*'Have you not heard?" said Katie, **we 
came back. 
We bought the farm we tenanted before. 
Am I so like her? so they said on board. 
Sir, if you knew her in her Eng-lish days, 
My mother, as it seems you did, the days 
That most she loves to talk of, come with me. 
My brother James is in the harvest-field: 
But she — you will be welcome — O, come in!" 



AYLMER'S FIELD. 
1793- 

Dust are our frames; and, gilded dust, our 
pride 
Looks only for a moment whole and sound ; 
Like that long-buried body of the king, 
Found lying with his urns and ornaments. 
Which at a touch of light, an air of heaven, 
Slipt into ashes, and was found no more. 

Here is a story which in rougher shape 
Came from a grizzled cripple, whom I saw 
Sunning himself in a waste field alone — 
Old, and a mine of memories — who had served, 
Long since, a bygone Rector of the place. 
And been himself a part of what he told. 

Sir Aylmer Aylmer, that almighty man. 
The county God — in whose capacious hall, 
Hung with a hundred shields, the family tree 
Sprang from the midriff of a prostrate king — 
Whose blazing wyvern weathercock'd the spire 



116 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Stood from his walls and wing'd his entry- 

gate, 
And swang besides on many a windy sign — 
Whose eyes from under a pyramidal head 
Saw from his windows nothing save his own — 
What lovelier of his own had he than her, 
His only child, his Edith, whom he loved 
As heiress and not heir regretfully? 
But "he that marries her marries her name.'* 
This fiat somewhat soothed himself and wife^ 
His wife a faded beauty of the Baths, 
Insipid as the Queen upon a card; 
Her all of thought and bearing hardly more 
Than his own shadow in a sickly sun. 

A land of hops and poppy-mingled corn. 
Little about it stirring save a brook ! 
A sleepy land, where under the same wheel 
The same old rut would deepen year by year; 
Where almost all the village had one name; 
Where Aylmer followed Aylmer at the Hall 
And Averill Averill at the Rectory 
Thrice over; so that Rectory and Hall, 
Bound in an immemorial intimacy, 
Were open to each other; tho' to dream 
That Love could bind them closer well had 

made 
The hoar hair of the Baronet bristle up 
With horror, worse than had he heard his priest 
Preach an inverted scripture, sons of men 
Daughters of God ; so sleepy was the land. 

And might not Averill, had he will'd it so. 
Somewhere beneath his own low range of 
roofs, 



AND OTHER POEMS. 117 

Have also set his many-shielded tree? 
There was an Aylmer-Averill marriage once. 
When the red rose was redder than itself, 
And York's white rose as red as Lancaster's, 
With wounded peace which each had prick'd to 

death. 
*'Not proven," Averill said, or laughingly 
"Some other race of Averills" — prov'n or no, 
What cared he? what, if other or the same? 
He lean'd not on his fathers but himself. 
But Leolin, his brother, living oft 
With Averill, and a year or two before 
Call'd to the bar, but ever call'd away 
By one low voice to one dear neighborhood, 
Would often, in his walks with Edith, claim 
A distant kinship to the gracious blood 
That shook the heart of Edith hearing him. 

Sanguine he was : a but less vivid hue 
Than of that islet in the chestnut-bloom 
Flamed in his cheek; and eager eyes, that still 
Took joyful note of all things joyful, beam'd. 
Beneath a manelike mass of rolling gold, 
Their best and brightest, when they dwelt on 

hers, 
Edith, whose pensive beauty, perfect else. 
But subject to the season or the mood. 
Shone like a mystic star between the less 
And greater glory varying to and fro, 
We know not wherefore ; bounteously made, 
And yet so finely, that a troublous touch 
Thinn'd, or would seem to thin her in a day, 
A joyous to dilate, as toward the light. 
And these have been tos-ether from the first. 



118 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Leolin's first nurse was, five years after, hers: 
So much the boy foreran; but when his date 
Doubled her own, for want of playmates, he 
(Since Averill was a decade and a half 
Her elder, and their parents underground) 
Had tost his ball and flown his kite, and roll'd 
His hoop to pleasure Edith, with her dipt 
Against the rush of the air in the prone swing, 
Made blossom-ball or daisy-chain, arranged 
Her garden, sow'd her name and kept it green 
In living letters, told her fairy-tales, 
Show'd her the fairy footings on the grass, 
The little dells of cowslips, fairy palms, 
The petty marestail forest, fairy pines. 
Or from the tiny pitted target blew 
What look'd a flight of fairy arrows aim'd 
All atone mark, all hitting: make-believes 
For Edith and himself: or else he forged, 
But that was later, boyish histories 
Of battle, bold adventure, dungeon, wreck, 
Flights, terrors, sudden rescues, and true love 
Crown'd after trial; sketches rude and faint. 
But where a passion yet unborn perhaps 
Lay hidden as the music of the moon 
Sleeps in the plain eggs of the nightingale. 
And thus together, save for college-times 
Or Temple-eaten terms, a couple, fair 
As ever painter painted, poet sang. 
Or Heaven in lavish bounty moulded, grew. 
And more and more, the maiden woman- 
grown, 
He wasted hours with Averill; there, when 

first 
The tented winter-field was broken up 



AND OTHER POEMS. 119 

Into that phalanx of the summer spears 
That soon should wear the garland; there 

again 
When burr and bine were gather'd lastly there 
At Christmas; ever welcome at the Hall, 
On whose dull sameness his full tide of youth 
Broke with a phosphorescence charming even 
My lady; and the Baronet yet had laid 
No bar between them: dull and self- involved, 
Tall and erect, but bending from his height 
With half-allowing smiles for all the world, 
And mighty courteous in the main — his pride 
Lay deeper than to wear it as his ring — 
He, like an Aylmer in his Aylmerism, 
Would care no more for Leolin's walking with 

her 
Than for his old Newfoundland's, when they 

ran 
To loose him at the stables, for he rose 
Twofooted at the limit of his chain. 
Roaring to make a third: and how should 

Love, 
Whom the cross-lightnings of four chance-met 

eyes 
Flash into fiery life from nothing, follow 
Such dear familiarities of dawn? 
Seldom, but when he does. Master of all. 

So these young hearts not knowing that they 
loved. 
Not she at least, nor conscious of a bar 
Between them, nor by plight or broken ring 
Bound, but an immemorial intimacy, 
Wander'd at will, and oft accompanied 



120 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

By Averill: his, a brother's love, that hung 
With wings of brooding shelter o'er her peace, 
Might have been other, save for Leolin's — 
Who knows? but so they wander' d, hour by 

hour 
Gather 'd the blossom that rebloom'd, and 

drank 
The magic cup that filled itself anew. 

A whisper half reveal' d her to herself. 
Far out beyond her lodges, where the brook 
Vocal, with here and there a silence, ran 
By sallowy rims, arose the laborers' homes, 
A frequent haunt of Edith, on low knolls 
That dimpling died into each other, huts 
At random scatter'd, each a nest in bloom. 
Her art, her hand, her counsel all had wrought 
About them: here was one that, summer- 
blanch 'd 
Was parcel bearded with the traveler's joy 
In Autumn, parcel ivy-clad ; and here 
The warm-blue breathings of a hidden hearth 
Broke from a bower of vine and honeysuckle : 
One look'd all rose tree, and another wore 
A close-set robe of jasmine sown with stars: 
This had a rosy sea of gillyflowers 
About it; this, a milky- way on earth, 
Like visions in the Northern dreamer's 

heavens, 
A lily-avenue climbing to the doors; 
One, almost to the martin-haunted eaves 
A summer burial deep in hollyhocks; 
Each, its own charm ; and Edith's everywhere; 
And Edith ever visitant with him, 




" Roird his hoop to pleasure Edith."— Page 118. 

Locksley Hall. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 121 

He but less loved than Edith, of her poor: 
For she — so lowly-lovely and so loving, 
Queenly responsive when the loyal hand 
Rose from the clay it work'd in as she past, 
Not sowing hedgerow texts and passing by, 
Nor dealing goodly counsel from a height 
That makes the lowest hate it, but a voice 
Of comfort and an open hand of help, 
A splendid presence flattering the poor roofs 
Revered as theirs, but kindlier than them- 
selves 
To ailing wife or wailing infancy 
Or old bedridden palsy, — was adored; 
He loved for her and for himself. A grasp 
Having the warmth and muscle of the heart, 
A childly way with children, and a laugh 
Ringing like proven golden coinage true. 
Were no false passport to that easy realm. 
Where once with Leolin at her side the girl. 
Nursing a child, and turning to the warmth 
The tender pink five-beaded baby-soles. 
Heard the good mother softly whisper "Bless, 
God bless 'em: marriages are made in 
Heaven." 

A flash of semi-jealousy clear'd it to her. 
My lady's Indian kinsman unannounced 
With half a score of swarthy faces came. 
His own, tho' keen and bold and soldierly, 
Sear'd by the close ecliptic, was not fair; 
Fairer his talk, a tongue that ruled the hour, 
Tho' seeming boastful: so when flrst he dash'd 
Into the chronicle of a deedful day, 
Sir Aylmer half forgot his lazy smile 



122 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Of patron, "Good! my lady's kinsman! good!" 
My lady with her fingers interlock'd, 
And rotatory thumbs on silken knees, 
Call'd all her vital spirits into each ear 
To listen: unawares they flitted off. 
Busying themselves about the flowerage 
That stood from out a stiff brocade in which, 
The meteor of a splendid season, she, 
Once with this kinsman, ah so long ago, 
Stept thro' the stately minuet of those days: 
But Edith's eager fancy hurried with him 
Snatch'd thro' the perilous passes of his life : 
Till Leolin ever watchful of her eye, 
Hated him with a momentary hate. 
Wife-hunting, as the rumor ran, was he: 
I know not, for he spoke not, only shower'd 
His oriental gifts on every one 
And most on Edith : like a storm he came. 
And shook the house, and like a storm he 
went. 

Among the gifts he left her (possibly 
He flow'd and ebb'd uncertain, to return 
When others had been tested) there was one, 
A dagger, in rich sheath with jewels on it 
Sprinkled about in gold that branch'd itself 
Fine as ice-ferns on January panes 
Made by a breath. I know not whence at first, 
Nor of what race, the work ; but as he told 
The story, storming a hill-fort of thieves 
He got it ; for their captain after fight. 
His comrades having fought their last below. 
Was climbing up the valley; at whom he shot: 
Down from the beetling crag to which he clung 



AND OTHER POEMS. 123 

Tumbled the tawny rascal at his feet, 

This dagg-er with him, which when now 

admired 
By Edith whom his pleasure was to please, 
At once the costly Sahib yielded to her. 

And Leolin, coming- after he was gone. 
Tost over all her presents petulantly: 
And when she show'd the wealthy scabbard, 

saying 
*'Look what a lovely piece of workmanship!" 
Slight was his answer, *'Well— I care not 

for it." 
Then playing with the blade he prick 'd his 

hand, 
*'A gracious gift to give a lady, this!" 
"But would it be more gracious," ask'd the 

girl, 
*'Were I to give this gift of his to one 
That is no lady?" ''Gracious? No," said he. 
"Me? — but I cared not for it. O pardon me, 
I seem to be ungraciousness itself." 
"Take it," she added, sweetly, "tho* his gift; 
For I am mor^ung.racious ev'n than you, 
I care not for ff-either;" and he said, 
"Why then I love it:" ^ut Sir Aylmer past. 
And neither loved vftor liked the thing he 

heard. 

The next day came a neighbor. Blues and 
reds 
They talk'd of: blues were sure of it, he 

thought : 
Then of the latest fox — where started — kill'd 



124 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

In such a bottom: ** Peter had the brush, 
My Peter, first:" and did Sir Aylmer know- 
That great pock-pitten fellow had been caught? 
Then made his pleasure echo, hand to hand, 
And rolling as it were the substance of it 
Between his palms a moment up and down — 
*'The birds were warm, the birds were warm 

upon him ; 
We have him now:" and had Sir Aylmer 

heard — 
Nay, but he must — the land was ringing 

of it— 
This blacksmith border-marriage — one they 

knew — 
Raw from the nursery — who could trust a 

child? 
That cursed France with her egalities! 
And did Sir Aylmer (deferentially 
With nearing chair and lower'd accent) think — 
For people talk'd — that it was wholly wise 
To let that handsome fellow Averill walk 
So freely with his daughter? people talk'd — 
The boy might get a notion into him: * 

The girl might be entangled ere she knew. 
Sir Aylmer Aylmer slowly stiffening spoke : 
"The girl and boy, Sir, know their differ- 
ences!" 
"Good," said his friend, "but watch!" and he, 

"Enough, 
More than enough, Sir! I can guard my own." 
They parted, and Sir Aylmer Aylmer w^atch'd. 

Pale, for on her the thunders of the house 
Had fallen first, was Edith that same night; 



AND OTHER POEMS. 125 

Pale as the Jephtlia's daughter, a rough piece 
Of early rigid color, under which 
Withdrawing by the counter door to that 
Which Leolin open'd, she cast back upon 

him 
A piteous glance, and vanish'd. He, as one 
Caught in a burst of unexpected storm, 
And pelted with outrageous epithets. 
Turning beheld the Powers of the House 
On either side the hearth, indignant; her, 
Cooling her false cheek with a feather fan," 
Him, glaring, by his own stale devil spurr'd, 
And, like a beast hard-ridden, breathing hard. 
"Ungenerous, dishonorable, base. 
Presumptuous! trusted as he was with her. 
The sole succeeder to their wealth, their lands, 
The last remaining pillar of their house, 
The one transmitter of their ancient name, 
Their child." ''Our child!" "Our heiress!" 

"Ours!" for still, 
Like echoes from beyond a hollow, came 
Her sicklier iteration. Last he said, 
"Boy, mark me ! for your fortunes are to make. 
I swear you shall not make them out of mine. 
Now inasmuch as you have practiced on her, 
Perplext her, made her half forget herself. 
Swerve from her duty to herself and us — 
Things in an Aylmer deem'd impossible. 
Far as we track ourselves — I say that this — 
Else I withdraw favor and countenance 
From you and yours forever — shall you do. 
Sir, when you see her — but you shall not see 

her — 
No, you shall write, and not to her, but me : 



ILG LOCKSLEY HALL, 

And you shall say that having spoken with me, 
And after look'd into yourself, you find 
That you meant nothing — as indeed you know 
That you meant nothing. Such a match as 

^this! 
Impossible, prodigious!" These were words, 
As meted by his measure of himself, 
Arguing boundless forbearance: after which, 
And Leolin's horror-stricken answer, *'I 
So foul a traitor to myself and her, 
Never, oh, never," for about as long 
As the wind-hover hangs in balance, paused 
Sir Aylmer reddening from the siorm within, 
Then broke all bonds of courtesy, and crying 
**Boy, should I find you by my doors again, 
Mv men shall lash you from them like a dog; 
Hence!" with a sudden execration drove 
The footstool from before him, and arose; 
So, stammering "scoundrel" out of teeth that 

ground 
As in a dreadful dream, while Leolin still 
Retreated, half-aghast, the fierce old man 
Follow'd, and under his own lintel stood 
Storming with lifted hands, a hoary face 
Meet for the reverence of the hearth, but now. 
Beneath a pale and unimpassion'd moon, 
Vext with unworthy madness, and deform 'd. 

Slowly and conscious of the rageful eye 
That watch'd him, till he heard the ponderous 

door 
Close, crashing with long echoes thro' the land, 
Went Leolin; then, his passions all in flood 
And masters of his motion, furiously 



AND OTHER POEMS. 127 

Down thro' the bright lawns to his brother's 

ran, 
And foam'd away his heart at Averill's ear: 
Whom Averill solaced as he might, amazed: 
The man was his, had been his father's, 

friend: 
He must have seen, himself had seen it long; 
He must have known, himself had known: 

besides, 
He never yet had set his daughter forth 
Here in the woman-markets of the west, 
Where our Caucasians let themselves be sold. 
Som.e one, he thought, had slander'd Leolin 

to him. 
"Brother, for I have loved you more as son 
Than brother, let me tell you: I myself — 
What is their pretty saying? jilted, is it? 
Jilted I was: I say it for your peace. 
Pain'd, and, as bearing in myself the shame 
The woman should have borne, humiliated, 
I lived for years a stunted sunless life ; 
Till after our good parents past away 
Watching] your growth, I seem'd again to 

grow. 
Leolin, I almost sin in envying you: 
The very whitest lamb in all my fold 
Loves you: I know her: the worst thought 

she has 
Is whiter even than her pretty hand: 
She must prove true : for, brother, where two 

fight 
The strongest wins, and truth and love are 

strength, 
And you are happy, let her parents be." 



128 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

But Leolin cried out the more upon them — 
Insolent, brainless, .heartless! heiress, wealth, 
Their wealth, their heiress! wealth enough 

was theirs 
For twenty matches. Were he lord of this, 
Why twenty boys and girls should marry on it, 
And fort}^ blest ones bless him, and himself 
Be wealthy still, ay wealthier. He believed 
This filthy marriage-hindering Mammon made 
The harlot of the cities: nature crost 
Was mother of the foul adulteries 
That saturate soul with body. Name, too! 

name. 
Their ancient name ! they might be proud ; its 

worth 
Was being Edith's. Ah how pale she had 

look'd 
Darling, to-night! they must have rated her 
Beyond all tolerance. These old pheasant- 
lords, 
These partridge-breeders of a thousand years, 
Who had mildew'd in their thousands, doing 

nothing 
Since Egbert — why, the greater their disgrace! 
Fall back upon a name ! rest, rot in that ! 
Not keep it noble, make it nobler? fools, 
With such a vantage-ground for nobleness! 
He had known a man, a quintessence of man, 
The life of all — who madly loved — and he. 
Thwarted by one of these old father-fools. 
Had rioted his life out, and made an end. 
He would not do it! her sweet face and faith 
Pleld him from that: but he had powers, he 

knew it: 



AND OTHER POEMS. 129 

Back would he to his studies, make a name, 
Name, fortune too: the world should ring of 

him 
To shame these mouldy Aylmers in their 

graves: 
Chancelor, or what is greatest would he be — 
"O brother, I am grieved to learn your grief — 
Give me my fling, and let me say my say." 

At which, like one that sees his own excess, 
And easily forgives it as his own. 
He laugh'd; and then was mute; but presently 
Wept Tike a storm : and honest Averill seeing 
How low his brother's mood had fallen, 

fetch 'd 
His richest beeswing from a binn reserved 
For banquets, praised the waning red, and 

told 
The vintage — when this Aylmer came of age — 
Then drank and past it; till at length the two, 
Tho' Leolin flamed and fell again, agreed 
That much allowance must be made for men. 
After an angry dream this kindlier glow 
Faded with morning, but his purpose held. 

Yet once by night again the lovers met, 
A perilous meeting under the tall pines 
That darken'd all the northward of her Hall. 
Him, to her meek and modest bosom prest 
In agony, she promised that no force, 
Persuasion, no, nor death could alter her: 
He, passionately hopefuller, would go, 
Labor for his own Edith, and return 
In such a sunlight of prosperity 

9 LocksleyHall 



133 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

He should not be rejected. "Write to me! 
They loved me, and because I love their child 
They hate me : there is war between us, dear, 
Which breaks all bonds but ours, we must 

remain 
Sacred to one another. " So they talk'd. 
Poor children, for their comfort: the wind 

blew; 
The rain of heaven, and their own bitter tears. 
Tears, and the careless rain of heaven, mixt 
Upon their faces, as they kiss'd each other 
In darkness, and above ihem roar'd the pine. 

So Leolin went ; and as we task ourselves 
To learn a language known but smatteringly 
In phrases here and there at random, toil'd 
Mastering the lawless science of our law, 
That codeless myriad of precedent. 
That wilderness of single instances, 
Thro' which a few, by wit or fortune led, 
May beat a pathway out to wealth and fame. 
The jests, that flash'd about the pleader's 

room. 
Lightning of the hour, the pun, the scurrilous 

tale,— 
Old scandals buried now seven decades deep 
In other scandals that have lived and died, 
And left the living scandal that shall die — 
Were dead to him already; bent as he was 
To make disproof of scorn, and strong in hopes, 
And prodigal of all brain-labor he, 
Charier of sleep, and wine, and exercise. 
Except when for a breathing-while at eve. 
Some niggard fraction of an hour, he ran 



AND OTHER POEMS. 131 

Beside the river-bank: and then indeed 
Harder the times were, and the hands of power 
Were bloodier, and the according hearts of 

men 
Seem'd harder too; but the soft river-breeze, 
Which fann'd the gardens of that rival rose 
Yet fragrant in a heart remembering 
His former talks with Edith, on him breathed 
Far purelier in his rushings to and fro. 
After his books, to flush his blood with air, 
Then to his books again. My lady's cousin, 
Half -sickening of his pension 'd afternoon. 
Drove in upon the student once or twice. 
Ran a Malayan amuck against the times. 
Had golden hopes for France and all mankind, 
Answer'd all queries touching those at home 
With a heaved shoulder and a saucy smile, 
And fain had haled him out into the world. 
And air'd him there : his nearer friend would 

say 
*' Screw not the chord too sharply lest it snap. " 
Then left alone he pluck'd her dagger forth 
From where his worldless heart had kept it 

warm, 
Kissing his vows upon it like a knight. 
And wrinkled benchers often talk'd of him 
Approvingly, and prophesied his rise : 
For heart, I think, help'd head: her letters 

too, 
Tho' far between, and coming fitfully 
Like broken music, written as she found 
Or made occasion, being strictly watch 'd, 
Charm 'd him thro' every labyrinth till he saw 
An end, a hope, a light breaking upon him. 



132 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

But they that cast her spirit into flesh, 
Her worldly-wise begetters, plagued themselves 
To sell her, those good parents, for her good. 
Whatever eldest-born of rank or wealth 
Might lie within their compass, him they lured 
Into their net made pleasant by the baits 
Of gold and beauty, wooing him to woo. 
So month by month the noise about their doors. 
And distant blaze of those dull banquets, made 
The nightly wirer of their innocent hare 
Falter before he took it. All in vain. 
Sullen, defiant, pitying, wroth, return'd 
Leolin's rejected rivals from their suit 
So often, that the folly taking wings 
Slipt o'er those lazy limits down the wind 
With rumor, and became in other fields 
A mockery to the yeoman over ale, 
And laughter to their lords: but those at home, 
As hunters round a hunted creature draw 
The cordon close and closer toward the death, 
Narrow'd her goings out and comings in; 
Forbade her first the house of Averill, 
Then closed her access to the wealthier farms, 
Last from her own home-circle of the poor 
They barr'd her: yet she bore it: yet her cheek 
Kept color: wonderous! but, O mystery! 
What amulet drew her down to that old oak, 
So old, that twenty years before, a part 
Falling had let appear the brand of John — 
Once grovelike, each huge arm a tree, but now 
The broken base of a black tower, a cave 
Of touchwood, with a single flourishing spray. 
There the manorial lord too curiously 
Raking in that millennial touchwood-dust 



AND OTHER POEMS. 133 

Found for himself a bitter treasure-trove; 
Burst his own wyvern on the seal, and read 
Writhing a letter from his child, for which 
Came at the moment Leolin's emissary, 
A crippled lad, and coming turn'd to fly, 
But scared with threats of jail and halter gave 
To him that fluster'd his poor parish wits 
The letter which he brought, and swore besides 
To play their go-between as heretofore, 
Nor let them know themselves betray 'd; and 

then, 
Soul-stricken at their kindness to him, went 
Hating his own lean heart and miserable. 

Thenceforward oft from out a despot dream 
The father panting woke, and oft, as dawn 
Aroused the black republic on his elms, 
Sweeping the froth fly from the fescue brush'd 
Thro' the dim meadow toward his treasure- 
trove, 
Seized it, took home, and to my lady, — who 

made 
A downward cresent of her minion mouth. 
Listless in all despondence, — read; and tore, 
As if the living passion symboVd there 
Were living nerves to feel the rent; and burnt, 
Now chafing at his own great self defied. 
Now striking on huge stumbling - blocks of 

scorn 
In babyisms, and dear diminutives 
Scatter'd all over the vocabulary 
Of such a love as like a chidden child, 
After much wailing, hush'd itself at last 
Hopeless of answer: then tho' Averill wrote 



134 LOCKSLEY HALL. 

And bade him with good heart sustain him- 
self— 
All would be well — the lover heeded not, 
But passionately restless came and went, 
And rustling once at night about the place. 
There by a keeper shot at, slightly hurt, 
Raging return'd: nor was it well for her 
Kept to the garden now, and grove of pines, 
Watch'd even there; and one was set to watch 
The watcher, and Sir Aylmer watch'd them 

all, 
Yet bitterer from his readings: once indeed, 
Warm'd with his wines, or taking pride in her, 
She look'd so sweet, he kiss'd her tenderly 
Not knowing what possess'd him: that one kiss 
Was Leolin's one strong rival upon earth; 
Seconded, for my lady follow 'd suit, 
Seem'd hope's returning rose : and then ensued 
A Martin's summer of his faded love. 
Or ordeal by kindness; after this 
He seldom crost his child without a sneer; 
The mother flow'd in shallower acrimonies: 
Never one kindly smile, one kindly word: 
So that the gentle creature shut from all 
Her charitable use, and face to face 
With twenty months of silence, slowly lost 
Nor greatly cared to lose, her hold on life. 
Last, some low fever raging round to spy 
The weakness of a people or a house. 
Like flies that haunt a wound, or deer, or men 
Or almost all that is, hurting the hurt — 
Save Christ as we believe him — found the girl 
And flung her down upon a couch of fire. 
Where careless of the household faces near. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 136 

And crying upon the name of Leolin, 
She, and with her the race of Aylmer, past. 

Star to star vibrates light : may soul to soul 
Strike thro' a finer element of her own? 
So, — from afar, — touch as at once? or why 
That night, that moment, when she named his 

name, 
Did the keen shriek ** Yes, love, yes, Edith, 

yes," 
Shrill, till the comrade of his chambers woke, 
And came upon him half-arisen from sleep. 
With a weird bright eye, sweating and tremb- 
ling. 
His hair as it were crackling into flames, 
His body half flung forward in pursuit, 
His long arms strech'd as to grasp a flyer: 
Nor knew he wherefore he had made the cry; 
And being much befool'd and idioted 
By the rough amity of the other, sank 
As into sleep again. The second day. 
My lady's Indian kinsman rushing in, 
A breaker of the bitter nev/s from home, 
Found a dead man, a letter edged with death 
Beside him, and the dag:o:er which himself 
Gave Edith, redden'd with no bandit's blood: 
"From Edith" was engraven on the blade. 

Then Averill went and gazed upon his death. 
And when he came again, his flock believed — 
Beholding how the years which are not Time's 
Had blasted him — that many thousand days 
Were dipt by horror from his term of life. 
Yet the sad mother, for the second death 



136 . LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Scarce touch'd her thro' that nearness of the 

first, 
And being used to find her pastor texts, 
Sent to the harrow'd brother, praying him 
To speak before the people of her child, 
And fixt the Sabbath. Darkly that day rose: 
Autumn's mock sunshine of the faded woods 
Was all the life of it ; for hard on these, 
A breathless burthen of low-folded heavens 
Stifled andchill'd at once; but every roof 
Sent out a listener: many too had known 
Edith among the hamlets round, and since 
The parents' harshness and the hapless loves 
And double death were widely murmur 'd, left 
Their own gray tower, or plain-faced taber- 
nacle. 
To hear him ; all in mourning these, and those 
With blots of it about them, ribbon, glove, 
Or kerchief; while the church, — one night, 

except 
For greenish glimmerings thro' the lancets, — 

made 
Still paler the pale head of him, who tower'd 
Above them, with his hopes in either grave. 

Long o'er his bent brows linger'd Averill, 
His face magnetic to the hand from which 
Livid he pluck 'd it forth, and labor 'd thro' 
His brief prayer-prelude, gave the verse 

''Behold, 
Your house is left unto you desolate!" 
But lapsed into so long a pause again 
As half amazed, half frighted all his flock: 
Then from his height and loneliness of grief 



AND OTHER POEMS. 137 

Bore down in flood, and dash'd his angry heart 
Against the desolations of the world. 

Never since our bad earth became one sea, 
Which rolling o'er the palaces of the proud, 
And all but those who knew the living God — 
Eight that were left to make a purer world — 
When since had flood, fire, earthquake, thunder 

wrought 
Such waste and havock as the idolatries, 
Which from the low light of mortality 
Shot up their shadows to the Heaven of 

Heavens, 
And worshipt their own darkness in the High- 
est? 
*'Gash thyself, priest, and honor thy brute Baal, 
And to thy worst self sacrifice thyself, 
For with thy worst self hast thou clothed thy 

God. 
Then came a Lord in no wise like a Baal. 
The babe shall lead the lion. Surely now 
The wilderness shall blossom as the rose. 
Crown thyself, worm, and worship thine own 

lusts! — 
No coarse and blockish God of acreage 
Stands at thy gate for thee to grovel to — 
Thy God is far diffused in noble groves 
And princely halls, and farms, and flowing 

lawns, 
And heaps of living gold that daily grow, 
And title scrolls and gorgeous heraldries. 
In such a shape dost thou behold thy God. 
Thou wilt not gash thy flesh for him'; for thine 
Fares richly, in fine linen, not a hair 
10 



138 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Ruffled upon the scarfskin, even while 
The deathless ruler of thy dying house 
Is wounded to the death that cannot die ; 
And tho' thou numberest with the followers 
Of One who cried, 'Leave all and follow me.* 
Thee therefore with His light about thy feet, 
Thee with His message ringing in thine ears, 
Thee shall thy brother man, the Lord from 

Heaven 
Born of a village girl, carpenter's son, 
Wonderful, Prince of peace, the Mighty God, 
Count the more base idolater of the two; 
Crueller: as not passing thro' the fire 
Bodies, but souls — thy children's — thro' the 

smoke 
The blight of low desires — darkening thine own 
To thine own likeness; or if one of these. 
Thy better born unhappily from thee, 
Should, as by miracle, grow straight and fair — 
Friends, I v/as bid to speak of such a one 
By those who most have cause to sorrow for 

her — 
Fairer than Rachel by the palmy well, 
Fairer than Ruth among the fields of corn. 
Fair as the Angel that said *Hail!' she seem'd, 
Who entering fiU'd the house with sudden 

light. 
For so mine own was brighten'd : where indeed 
The roof so lowly but that beam of Heaven 
Dawn'd sometime thro' the doorway? whose 

the babe 
Too ragged to be fondled on her lap, 
Warm'd at her bosom? The poor child of 

shame 



AND OTHER POEMS. 139 

The common care whom no one cared for, leapt 
To greet her, wasting his forgotten heart, 
As with the mother he had never known, 
In gambols ; for her fresh and innocent eyes 
Had such a star of morning in their blue, 
That all neglected places of the field 
Broke into nature's music when they saw her. 
Low was her voice, but won mysterious way 
Thro' the seal'd ear to which a louder one 
Was all but silence — free of alms her hand — 
The hand that robed your cottage- walls with 

flowers 
Has often toil'd to clothe your little ones; 
How often placed upon the sick man's brow 
Cool'd it, or laid his feverous pillow smooth! 
Had you one sorrow and she shared it not? 
One burthen and she would not lighten it? 
One spiritual doubt she did not soothe? 
Or when some heat of difference sparkled out, 
How sweetly would she glide between your 

wraths. 
And steal you from each other! for she walk'd 
Wearing the light yoke of that Lord of love. 
Who still'd the rolling wave of Galilee! 
And one — of him I was not bid to speak — 
Was always with her, whom you also knew. 
Him too you loved, for he was worthy love. 
And these had been together from the first; 
They might have been together till the last. 
Friends, this frail bark of ours, when sorely 

tried. 
May wreck itself without the pilot's guilt. 
Without the captain's knowledge: hope with 

me. 



140 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Whose shame is that, if he went hence with 

shame? 
Kor mine the fault, if losing both of these 
I cry to vacant chairs and widow 'd walls, 
"^My house is left unto me desolate.' " 

While thus he spoke, his hearers wept; but 

some 
Sons of the glebe, with other frowns than those 
That knit themselves for summer shadow, 

scowl' d 
At their great lord. He, when it seem'd he 

saw 
No pale sheet-lightnings from afar, but fork'd 
Of the near storm, and aiming at his head, 
Sat anger-charm 'd from sorrow, soldierlike. 
Erect: but when the preacher's cadence flow'd 
Softening thro' all the gentle attributes 
Of his lost child, the wife, who watch'd his 

face. 
Paled at a sudden twitch of his iron mouth ; 
And ' ' O pray God that he hold up, ' * she thought 
"'Or surely I shall shame myself and him. " 

**Nor yours the blame — for who beside your 

hearths 
Can take her place — if echoing me you cry 
*Our house is left unto us desolate?' 
But thou, O thou that killest, hadst thou 

known, 
O thou that stonest, hadst thou understood 
The things belonging to thy peace and ours! 
Is there no prophet but the voice that calls 
Doom upon kings, or in the waste 'Repent?' 



AND OTHER POEMS. 141 

Is not our own child on the narrow way, 

Who down to those that saunter in the broad 

Cries 'Come up hither,' as a prophet to us? 

Is there no stoning save with flint and rock? 

Yes, as the dead we weep for testify — 

No desolation but by sword and fire? 

Yes, as your moanings witness, and myself 

Am lonelier, darker, earthlier for my loss. 

Give me your prayers, for he is past your 

prayers, 
Not past the living fount of pity in Heaven. ; 
But I that thought myself long-suffering, meek. 
Exceeding 'poor in spirit' — how the words 
Have twisted back upon themselves, and mean 
Vileness, we are grown so proud — I wish'd my 

voice 
A rushing tempest of the wrath of God 
To blow these sacrifices thro' the world — 
Sent like the twelve-divided concubine 
To inflame the tribes: but there — out yonder 

— earth 
Lightens from her own centra! Hell — O there 
The red fruit of an old idolatry — 
The heads of chiefs and princes fall so fast,, 
They cling together in the ghastly sack — 
The land all shambles — naked marriages 
Flash from the bridge, and ever-murder'd 

France, 
By shores that darken with the gathering wolf. 
Runs in a river of blood to the sick sea. 
Is this a time to madden madness then? 
Was this a time for these to flaunt their pride? 
May Pharaoh's darkness, folds as dense as those 
Which hid the Holiest from the people's eyes„ 



142 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Ere the great death, shroud this great sin from 

all! 
Doubtless our narrow world must canvass it : 

rather pray for those and pity them, 
Who, thro' their own desire accomplish'd, 

bring 
Their own gray hairs with sorrow to the grave — 
Who broke the bond which they desired to 

break, 
Which else had link'd their race with times to 

come — 
Who wove coarse webs to snare her purity, 
Grossly contriving their dear daughter's good — 
Poor souls, and knew not what they did, but 

sat 
Ignorant, devising their own daughter's death! 
May not that earthly chastisement suffice? 
Have not our love and reverence left them 

bare? 
Will not another take their heritage? 
Will there be children's laughter in their hall 
Forever and forever, or one stone 
Left on another, or is it a light thing 
That I, their guest, their host, their ancient 

friend, 

1 made by these the last of all my race, 
Must cry to these the last of theirs, as cried 
Christ ere His agony to those that swore 
Not by the temple but the gold, and made 
Their own traditions God, and slew the Lord, 
And left their memories a world's curse — 

'Behold,' 
Your house is left unto you desolate. ' " 



AND OTHER POEMS. 143 

Ended he had not, but she brook'd no more: 
Long since her heart had beat remorselessly, 
Her crampt-up sorrow pain'd her, and a sense 
Of meanness in her unresisting life. 
Then their eyes vext her; for on entering 
He had cast the curtains of their seat aside — 
Black velvet of the costliest — she herself 
Had seen to that: fain had she closed them 

now, 
Yet dared not stir to do it, only near'd 
Her husband inch by inch, but when she laid, 
Wife-like, her hand in one of his, he veil'd 
His face with the other, and at once, as falls 
A creeper when the prop is broken, fell 
The woman shrieking at his feet, and swoon 'd. 
Then her own people bore along the nave 
Her pendant hands, and narrow meagre face 
Seam'd with the shallow cares of fifty years: 
And her the Lord of all the landscape round 
Ev'n to its last horizon, and of all 
Who peer'd at him so keenly, follow'd out 
Tall and erect, but in the middle aisle 
Reel'd, as a footsore ox in crowded ways 
Stumbling across the market to his death, 
Unpitied; for he groped as blind, and seem'd 
Always about to fall, grasping the pews 
And oaken finials till he touch'd the door; 
Yet to the lychgate where his chariot stood,. 
Strode from the porch, tall and erect again. 

But nevermore did either pass the gate 
Save under pall with bearers. In one month, 
Thro* weary and yet ever wearier hours, 
The childless mother went to seek her child ; 



144 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

And when he felt the silence of his house 

About him, and the change and not the change, 

And those fixt eyes of painted ancestors 

Staring forever from their gilded walls 

On him their last descendant, his own head 

Began to droop, to fall ; the man became 

Imbecile; his one word was "desolate;" 

Dead for two years before his death was he; 

But when the second Christmas came, escaped 

His keepers, and the silence which he felt, 

To find a deeper in the narrow gloom 

By wife and child; nor wanted at his end 

The dark retinue reverencing death 

At golden thresholds; nor from tender hearts, 

And those who sorrow'd o'er a vanish'd race, 

Pity, the violet on the tyrant's grave. 

Then the great Hall was wholly broken down, 

And the broad woodland parcell'd into farms; 

And where the two contrived their daughter's 

good. 
Lies the hawk's cast, the mole has made his 

run, 
The hedgehog underneath the plantain bores. 
The rabbit fondles his own harmless face, 
The slow-worm creeps, and the thin weasel 

there 
Follows the mouse, and all is open field. 

SEA DREAMS. 

A city clerk, but gently born and bred; 
His wife, an unknown artist's orphan child — 
One babe was theirs, a Margaret, three years 
old: 



AND OTHER POEMS. 145 

They, thinking that her clear germander eye 
Droopt in the giant-factoried city-gloom, 
Came, with a month's leave given them, to 

the sea: 
For which his gains were dock'd, however 

small: 
Small were his gains, and hard his work; 

besides, 
Their slender household fortunes (for the man 
Had risk'd his little) like the little thrift, 
Trembled in perilous places o'er a deep: 
And oft, when sitting all alone, his face 
Would darken, as he cursed his credulousness, 
And that one unctuous mouth which lured 

him, rogue. 
To buy strange shares in some Peruvian mine. 
Now seaward-bound for health they gain'd a 

coast, 
All sand and cliff and deep-inrunning cave, 
At close of day; slept, woke, and went the 

next. 
The Sabbath, pious variers from the church. 
To chapel; where a heated pulpiteer. 
Not preaching simple Christ to simple men, 
Announced the coming doom, and fulminated 
Against the scarlet woman and her creed; 
For sideways up he swung his arms, and 

shriek'd 
*'Thus, thus with violence," ev'n as if he held 
The Apocalyptic millstone, and himself 
Were that great Angel; "Thus with violence 
Shall Babylon be cast into the sea; 
Then comes the close." The gentle-hearted 

wife 

10 LockslpyHall 



14G LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Sat shuddering at the ruin of a world; 

He at his own: but when the wordy storm 

Had ended, forth they came and paced the 

shore, 
Ran in and out the long sea-framing caves. 
Drank the large air, and saw, but scarce 

believed 
(The sootflake of so many a summer still 
Clung to their fancies) that they saw, the sea. 
So now on sand they walk'd, and now on cliff. 
Lingering about the thymy promontories, 
Till all the sails were darken'd in the west, 
And rose in the east: then homeward and to 

bed: 
Where she, who kept a tender Christian hope, 
Haunting a holy text, and still to that 
Returning, as the bird returns, at night, 
*'Let not the sun go down upon your wrath," 
Said, "Love, forgive him:" but he did not 

speak ; 
And silenced by that silence lay the wife. 
Remembering her dear Lord who died for 

all, 
And musing on the little lives of men^ 
And how they mar this little by their feuds. 

But while the two were sleeping, a full tide 
Rose with ground-swell, which, on the fore- 
most rocks 
Touching, upjetted in spirits of wild sea-smoke, 
And scaled in sheets of wasteful foam, and fell 
In vast sea-cataracts — ever and anon 
Dead claps of thunder from within the cliffs 
Heard thro* the living roar. At this the babe. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 147 

Their Margaret cradled near them, wall'd and 

woke 
The mother, and the father suddenly cried, 
**A wreck, a wreck!" then turn'd, and groan- 
ing said, 

** Forgive! How many will say, * forgive, ' 

and find 
A sort of absolution in the sound 
To hate a little longer! No, the sin 
That neither God .lor man can well forgive, 
Hypocrisy, I saw it in him at once. 
Is it so true that second thoughts are best? 
Not first, and third, which are a riper first? 
Too ripe, too late! they come too late for use. 
Ah love, there surely lives in man and beast 
Something divine to warn them of their foes: 
And such a sense, when first I fronted him, 
Said, 'Trust him not;' but after, when I 

came 
To know him more, I lost it, knew him less; 
Fought with what seem'd my own uncharity; 
Sat at his table; drank his costly wines; 
Made more and more allowance for his talk ; 
Went further, fool! and trusted him with all. 
All my poor scrapings from a dozen years 
Of dust and deskwork: there is no such 

mine, 
None ; but a gulf of ruin, swallowing gold, 
Not making. Ruin'd! ruin'd! the sea roars 
Ruin: a fearful night!" 

"Not fearful; fair," 
Said the good wife, "if every star in heaven 



148 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Can make it fair: you do but hear the tide. 
Had you ill dreams?" 

"O yes," he said, "I dream'd 
Of such a tide swelling toward the land, 
And I from out the boundless outer deep 
Swept with it to the shore, and enter'd one 
Of those dark caves that run beneath the cliffs. 
I thought the motion of the boundless deep 
Bore thro' the cave, and I was heaved upon it 
In darkness: then I saw one lovely star 
Larger and larger. 'What a w^orld, ' I thought, 
'To live in!' but in moving on I found 
Only the landward exit of the cave, 
Bright with the sun upon the stream beyond: 
And near the light a giant woman sat, 
All over earthy, like a piece of earth, • 
A pickaxe in her hand: then out I slipt 
Into a land all sun and blossom, trees 
As high as heaven, and every bird that sings: 
And here the night-light flickering in my eyes 
Awoke me." 

"That was then your dream," she said, 
"Not sad, but sweet." 

"So sweet, I lay," said he, 
"And mused upon it, drifting up the stream 
In fancy, till I slept again, and pieced 
The broked vision; for I dream'd that still 
The motion of the great deep bore me on, 
And that the woman walk'd upon the brink: 
I wonder'd at her strength, and ask'd her 
of it: 



AND OTHER POEMS. 149 

'It came,' she said, 'by working in the mines:' 

then to ask her of my shares, I thought ; 
And ask'd; but not a word; she shook her 

head. 
And then the motion of the current ceased, 
And there was rolling thunder; and we 

reach'd 
A mountain, like a wall of burs and thorns ; 
But she with her strong feet up the steep hill 
Trod out a path: I follow'd; and at top 
She pointed seaward : there a fleet of glass, 
That seem'd a fleet of jewels under me. 
Sailing along before a gloomy cloud 
That not one moment ceased to thunder, past 
In sunshine: right across its track there lay, 
Down in the water, a long reef of gold. 
Or what seem'd gold: and I was glad at first 
To think that in our often-ransack'd world 
Still so much gold was left; and then T 

fear'd 
Lest the gay navy there should splinter on it, 
And fearing waved my arm to warn them off; 
An idle signal, for the brittle fleet 
(I thought I could have died to save it) near'd, 
Touch'd, clink'd, and clash'd, and vanish'd, 

and I woke, 

1 heard the clash so clearly. Now I see 

My dream was Life; the woman honest Work; 
And my poor venture but a fleet of glass 
Wreck 'd on a reef of visionary gold." 

*'Nay," said the kindly wife to comfort him, 
"You raised your arm, you tumbled down 
and broke 



150 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

The glass with little Margaret's medicine 

in it; 
And, breaking that, you made and broke your 

dream : 
A trifle makes a dream, a trifle breaks." 

"No trifle," groan'd the husband; "yes- 
terday 
I met him suddenly in the street, and ask'd 
That which I ask'd the woman in my dream. 
Like her, he shook his head. 'Show me the 

books!' 
He dodged me with a long and loose account. 
'The books, the books!' but he, he could not 

wait, 
Bound on a matter he of life and death 
When the great Books (see Daniel seven and 

ten) 
Were open'd, I should find he meant me well; 
And then began to bloat himself, and ooze 
All over with the fat affectionate smile 
That makes the widow lean. 'My dearest 

friend. 
Have faith, have faith! We live by faith,' 

said he; 
'And all things work together for the good 
Of those* — it makes me sick to quote him — 

last 
Gript my hand hard, and with God-bless-you 

went. 
I stood like one that had received a blow : 
I found a hard friend in his loose accounts, 
A loose one in the hard grip of his hand, 
A curse in his God-bless-you : then my eyes 



AND OTHER POEMS. 151 

Pursued him down the street, and far away, 
Among the honest shoulders of the crowd, 
Read rascal in the motions of his back, 
And scoundrel in the supple-sliding knee." 

**Was he so bound, poor soul?" said the good 
wife; 
"So are we all: but do not calj him, love, 
Before you prove him, rogue, and proved, for- 
give. 
His gain is loss; for he that wrongs his friend 
Wrongs himself more, and ever bears about 
A silent court of justice in his breast, 
Himself the judge and jury, and himself 
The prisoner at the bar, ever condemn'd : 
And that drags down his life: then comes 

what comes 
Hereafter: and he meant, he said he meant, 
Perhaps he meant, or partly meant, you 
well." 

*' *With all his conscience and one eye 

askew' — 
Love, let me quote these lines, that you may 

learn 
A man is likewise counsel for himself. 
Too often, in that silent court of yours — 
' With all his conscience and one eye askew, 
So false, he partly took himself for true ; 
Whose pious talk, when most his heart was 

dry, 
Made wet the crafty crowsfoot round his eye; 
Who, never naming God except for gain, 
So never took that useful name in vain. 



152 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Made Him his catspaw and the cross his tool, 
And Christ the bait to trap his dupe and fool; 
Nor deeds of gift, but gifts of grace he forged. 
And snake-like slimed his victim ere he 

gorged ; 
And oft at Bible readings, o'er the rest 
Arising, did his holy oily best. 
Dropping the too rough H in Hell and Heaven, 
To spread the Word by which himself had 

thriven. ' 
How like you this old satire?" 

"Nay," she said, 
"I loathe it: he had never kindly heart, 
Nor ever cared to better his own kind, 
Who first wrote satire, with no pity in it. 
But will you hear my dream, for I had one 
That altogether went to music? Still 
It awed me." 

Then she told it, having dream 'd 
Of that same coast. 

— But round the North, a light. 
A belt, it seem'd, of luminous vapor, lay, 
And ever in it a low musical note 
Swell'd up and died; and, as it swell'd, a ridge 
Of breaker issued from the belt, and still 
Grew with the growing note, and when the note 
Had reach'd a thunderous fulness, on those 

cliffs 
Broke, mixt with awful light (the same as that 
Living within the belt) whereby she saw 
That all those lines of cliffs were cliffs no more, 



AND OTHER POEMS. 153 

But huge cathedral fronts of every age. 
Grave, florid, stern, as far as eye could see, 
One after one : and then the great ridge drew, 
Lessening to the lessening music, back, 
And past into the belt and swell' d again 
Slowly to music: ever when it broke 
The statues, king or saint, or founder fell ; 
Then from the gaps and chasms of ruin left 
Came men and women in dark clusters round, 
Some crying, "Set them up! they shall not 

fall!" 
And others, "Let them lie, for they have 

fall'n." 
And still they strove and wrangled: and she 

grieved 
In her strange dream, she knew not wh}^ to 

find 
Their wildest wailings never out of tune 
With that sweet note ; and ever as their shrieks 
Ran highest up the gamut, that great wave 
Returning, while none mark'd it, on the crov^rd 
Broke, mixt with awful light, and show'd their 

eyes ' 

Glaring, and passionate looks, and swept away 
The men of flesh and blood, and men of stone, 
To the waste deeps together. 

"Then I fixt 
My wistful eyes on two fair images. 
Both crown 'd with stars and high among the 

stars, — 
The Virgin Mother standing with her child 
High up on one of those dark minster-fronts — 
Till she began to totter, and the child 



154 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Clung to the mother, and sent out a cry 
Which mixt with little Margaret's, and I 

woke, 
And my dream awed me : — well — but what are 

dreams? 
Yours came but from the breaking of a glass. 
And mine but from the crying of a child." 

*'Child? No!" said he, "but this tide's roar, 

and his 
Our Boanerges with his threats of doom, 
And loud-lung'd Antibabylonianisms 
(Altho* I grant but little music there) 
Went both to make your dream : but if there 

were 
A music harmonizing our wild cries, 
Sphere-music such as that you dream *d about, 
Why, that would make our passions far too like 
The discords dear to the musician. No — 
One shriek of hate would jar all the hymns of 

heaven: 
True Devils with no ear, they howl in tune 
With nothing but the Devil!" 

" 'True* indeed 
One of our town, but later by an hour 
Here than ourselves, spoke with me on the 

shore : 
While you were running down the sands, and 

made 
The dimpled flounce of the sea- furbelow flap, 
Good man, to please the child. She brought 

strange news. 
Why were you silent when I spoke to-night? 



AND OTHER POEMS. 155 

I had set my heart on 3'our forgiving him 
Before you knew. We must forgive the dead. ' 

*'Dead! who is dead?" 

**The man your eye pursued 
A little after you had parted with him, 
He suddenly dropt dead of heart-disease. " 
*'Dead? he? of heart-disease? what heart had 

he 
To died of? dead!" 

**Ah, dearest, it there be 
A devil in man, there is an angel too. 
And if he did that wrong you charge him with, 
His angel broke his heart. But your rough 

voice 
(You spoke so loud) has roused the child again. 
Sleep, little birdie, sleep! will she not sleep 
Without her 'little birdie?' well then, sleep, 
And I will sing you 'birdie.' " 

Saying this, 
The woman half turn'd round from him she 

loved, 
Left him one hand, and reaching thro' the 

night 
Her other, found (for it was close beside) 
And half-embraced the basket cradle-head 
With one soft arm, which, like the pliant 

bough 
That moving moves the nest and nestling, 

sway'd 
The cradle, while she sang this baby song. 



156 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

What does little birdie say 
In her nest at peep of day? 
Let me fly, says little birdie, 
Mother, let me fly away. 
Birdie, rest a little longer. 
Till the little wings are stronger, 
So she rests a little longer, 
Then she flies away. 

What does little baby say, 
In her bed at peep ot day? 
Baby says, like little birdie, 
Let me rise and fly away. 
Baby, sleep a little longer. 
Till the little limbs are stronger, 
If she sleeps a little longer, 
Baby too shall fly away. 

*'She sleeps: let us too, let all evil, sleep. 
He also sleeps — another sleep than ours. 
He can do no more wrong : forgive him, dear. 
And I shall sleep the sounder!" 

Then the man, 
"His deeds yet live, the worst is yet to come. 
Yet let your sleep for this one night be sound.' 
I do forgive him ! ' ' 

** Thanks, my love," she said, 
' * Your own will be the sweeter, ' ' and they slept. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 157 



LUCRETIUS. 

Lucilia, wedded to Lucretius, found 
Her master cold; for when the morning flush 
Of passion and the first embrace had died 
Between them, tho' he lov'd her none the less. 
Yet often when the woman heard his foot 
Return from pacings in the field, and ran 
To greet him with a kiss, the master took 
Small notice, or austerely, for — his mind 
Half buried in some weightier argument, 
Or fancy, borne perhaps upon the rise 
And long roll of the Hexameter— he past 
To turn and ponder those three hundred scrolls 
Left by the Teacher, whom he held divine. 
She brook'd it not; but wrathful, petulant, 
Dreaming some rival, sought and found a witch 
Who brew'dthe philtre which had power, they 

said. 
To lead an errant passion home again. 
And this, at times, she mingled with his drink, 
And this destroy'd him; for the wicked broth 
Confused the chemic labor of the blood. 
And tickling the brute brain within the man's 
Made havock among those tender cells, and 

check 'd 
His power to shape: he loathed himself; and 

once 
After a tempest woke upon a morn 
That mock'd him with returning calm, and 

cried : 

'* Storm in the night! for thrice I heard the 
rain 



158 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Rushing- ; and once the flash of a thunderbolt — 
Methought I never saw so fierce a fork — 
Struck out the streaming mountain-side, and 

show'd 
A riotous confluence of watercourses 
Blanching and billowing in a hollow of it, 
Where all but yester-eve was dusty-dry. 

"Storm, and what dreams, ye holy Gods, 

what dreams! 
For thrice I waken 'd after dreams. Perchance 
We do but recollect the dreams that come 
Just ere the waking: terrible! for it seem'd 
A void was made in Nature ; all her bonds 
Crack'd; and I saw the flaring atom-streams 
And torrents of her myriad universe. 
Ruining along the illimitable inane. 
Fly on to clash together again, and make 
Another and another frame of things 
Forever: that was mine, my dream, I knew 

it— 
Of and belonging to me, as the dog 
With inward yelp and restless forefoot plies 
His function of the woodland: but the next! 
I thought that all the blood by Sylla shed 
Came driving rainlike down again on earth, 
And where it dash'd the reddening meadow, 

sprang 
No dragon warriors from Cadmean teeth, 
For these I thought my dream would show to 

me. 
But girls, Hetairai, curious in their art, 
Hired animalisms, vile as those that made 
The mulberry-faced Dictator's orgies worse 



AND OTHER POEMS. 159 

Than aught the fable of the quiet Gods, 

And hands they mixt, and yell'd and round 

me drove 
In narrowing circles till I yell'd again 
Half-suffocated, and sprang up, and saw — 
Was it the first beam of my latest day? 

*'Then, then, from utter gloom stood out 

the breasts, 
The breasts of Helen, and hoveringly a sword 
Now over and now under, now direct, 
Pointed itself to pierce, but sank down shamed 
At all that beauty; and as I stared, a fire, 
The fire that left a roofless Ilion, 
Shot out of them, and scorch 'd me that I 

woke. 

"Is this thy vengeance, holy Venus, thine, 
Because I would not one of thine own doves. 
Not ev'n a rose, were offer'd to thee? thine, 
Forgetful how my rich prooemion makes 
Thy glory fly along the Italian field. 
In lays that will outlast thy Deity? 

*' Deity? nay, thy worshipers. My tongue 
Trips, or I speak profanely. Which of these 
Angers thee most, or angers thee at all? 
Not if thou be' St of those who, far aloof 
From envy, hate, and pity, and spite and 

scorn, 
Live the great life which all our greatest fain 
Would follow, center' d in eternal calm. 

"Nay, if thou canst, O Goddess, like our- 
selves 



160 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Touch, and be touch 'd, then would I cry to 

thee 
To kiss thy Mavors, roll thy tender arms 
Round him, and keep him from the lust of 

blood 
That makes a steaming slaughter-house of 

Rome. 

"Ay, but I meant not thee ; I meant not her, 
Whom all the pines of Ida shook to see 
Slide from that quiet heaven of hers, and tempt 
The Trojan, while his neat-herds were abroad; 
Nor her that o'er her wounded hunter wept 
Her Deity false in human-amorous tears; 
Nor when her beardless apple-arbiter 
Decided fairest. Rather, O ye Gods, 
Poet-like, as the great Sicilian called 
Calliope to grace his golden verse — 
Ay, and this Kypris also — did I take 
That popular name of thine to shadow forth 
The all-generating powers and genial heat 
Of Nature, when she strikes thro' the thick 

blood 
Of cattle, and light is large, and lambs are 

glad 
Nosing the mother's udder, and the bird 
Makes his heart voice amid the blaze of flowers: 
Which things appear the work of mighty Gods. 

*'The Gods! and if I go my work is left 
Unfinish'd' — if I go. The Gods, who haunt 
The lucid interspace of world and world. 
Where never creeps a cloud, or moves a wind. 
Nor ever falls the least white star of snow. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 161 

Nor ever lowest roll of thunder moans, 

Nor sound of human sorrow mounts to mar 

Their sacred everlasting calm ! and such, 

Not all so fine, nor so divine a calm, 

Not such, nor all unlike it, man may gain 

Letting his own life go. The Gods, the Gods! 

If all be atoms, how then should the Gods 

Being atomic not be dissoluble. 

Not follow the great law? My master held 

That Gods there are, for all men so believe. 

I prest my footsteps into his, and meant 

Surely to lead my Memmius in a train 

Of flowery clauses onward to the proof 

That Gods there are, and deathless. Meant? I 

meant? 
I have forgotten what I meant : my mind 
Stumbles, and all my faculties are lamed. 

*'Look where another of our Gods, the Sun, 
Apollo, Delius, or of older use 
All-seeing Hyperion — what you will — 
Has mounted yonder; since he never sware. 
Except his wrath were wreak'd on wretched 

man. 
That he would only shine among the dead 
Hereafter; tales! for never yet on earth 
Could dead flesh creep, or bits of roasting ox 
Moan round the spit — nor knows he what he 

sees; 
King of the East altho' he seem, and girt 
With song and flame and fragrance, slowly 

lifts 
His golden feet on those empurpled stairs 
That climb into the windy halls of heaven: 

11 LocksleyHaU 



162 LOCKSLEY HALL. 

And here he glances on an eye new-born, 
And gets for greeting but a wail of pain; 
And here he stays upon a freezing orb 
That fain would gaze upon him to the last; 
And here upon a yellow eyelid fall'n 
And closed by those who mourn a friend in 

vain, 
Not thankful that his troubles are no more. 
^ And me, altho' his fire is on my face 
^ Blinding, he sees not, nor at all can tell 
; Whether I mean this day to end myself, 
!Or lend an ear to Plato where he says, 
X That men like soldiers may not quit the post 
J; Allotted by the Gods : but he that holds 
• The Gods are careless, wherefore need he care 
Greatly for them, nor rather plunge at once, 
Being troubled, wholly out of sight, and sink 
Past earthquake — ay, and gout and stone, that 

break 
Body toward death, and palsy, death-in-life. 
And wretched age — and worst disease of all, 
These prodigies of myriad nakednesses. 
And twisted shapes of lust, unspeakable. 
Abominable, strangers at my hearth 
Not welcome, harpies miring every dish, 
-The phantom husks of something foully done. 
And fleeting thro' the boundless universe, 
And blasting the long quiet of my breast 
With animal heat and dire insanity? 

"How should the mind, except it loved 
them, clasp 
These idols to herself? or do they fly 
Now thinner, and now thicker, like the flakes 



AND OTHER POEMS. , 163 

In a fall of snow, and so press in, perforce 
Of multitude, as crowds that in an hour 
Of civic tumult jam the doors, and bear 
The keepers down, and throng, their rags and 

they 
The basest, far into that council-hall 
Where sit the best and stateliest of the land! 

"Can I not fling this horror off me again, 
Seeing with how great ease Nature can smile, 
Balmier and nobler from her bath of storm, 
At random ravage? and how easily 
The mountain there has cast his cloudy slough. 
Now towering o'er him in serenest air, 
A mountain o'er a mountain, — ay, and within 
All hollow as the hopes and fears of men? 

"But who was he, that in the garden snared 
Picus and Faunus, rustic Gods? a tale 
To laugh at — more to laugh at in myself — 
For look! what is it? there? yon arbutus 
Totters; a noiseless riot underneath 
Strikes through the wood, sets all the tops 

quivering — 
The mountain quickens into Nymph and Faun ; 
And here an Oread — how the sun delights 
To glance and shift about her slippery sides. 
And rosy knees and supple roundedness, 
And budded bosom-peaks — who this way runs 
Before the rest — A satyr, a satyr, see. 
Follows; but him I proved impossible; 
Twy-natured is no nature; yet he draws 
Nearer and nearer, and I scan him now 
Beastlier than any phantom of his kind 



164 LOCKSLEY HALL. 

That ever butted his rough brother-brute 
For lust or lusty blood or provender: 
I hate, abhor, spit, sicken at him ; and she 
Loathes him as well; such a precipitate heel, 
Fledged as it were with Mercury's ankle-wing, 
Whirls her to me : but will she fling herself, 
Shameless upon me? Catch her, goat-foot: 

nay. 
Hide, hide them, million-myrtled wilderness, 
And cavern-shadowing laurels, hide! do I 

wish — 
What? — that the bush were leafless? or to 

whelm 
All of them in one massacre? O ye Gods, 
I know you careless, yet, behold, to you 
From childly wont and ancient use I call — 
I thought I lived securely as yourselves — 
No lewdness, narrowing envy, monkey-spite. 
No madness of ambition, avarice, none : 
No larger feast than under plane or pine 
With neighbors laid along the grass, to take 
Only such cups as left us friendly-warm, 
Affirming each his own philosophy — 
Nothing to mar the sober majesties 
Of settled, sweet, Epicurean life. 
But now it seems some unseen monster lays 
His vast and filthy hands upon my will, 
Wrenching it backward into his ; and spoils 
My bliss in being; and it was not great; 
For save when shutting reasons up in rhythm. 
Or Heliconian honey in living words. 
To make a truth less harsh, I often grew 
Tired of so much within our little life, 
Or of so little in our little life — 



AND OTHER POEMS. 165 

Poor little life, that toddles half an hour 
Crown'd with a flower or two, and there an 

end — 
And since the nobler pleasure seems to fade, 
Why should I, beastlike as I find myself, 
Not manlike end myself? — our privilege — 
What beast has heart to do it? And what 

man, 
What Roman would be dragg'd in triumph 

thus? 
Not I; not he, who bears one name with her 
Whose death-blow struck the dateless doom of 

kings 
When, brooking not the Tarquin in her veins, 
She made her blood in sight of Collatine 
And all his peers, flushing the guiltless air 
Spout from the maiden fountain in her heart. 
And from it sprang the Commonwealth, which 

breaks 
As I am breaking now ! 

"And therefore now 
Let her, that is the womb and tomb of all, 
Great Nature, take, and forcing far apart 
Those blind beginnings that have made me 

man. 
Dash them anew together at her will 
Thro' all her cycles — into man once more. 
Or beast or bird or fish, or opulent flower: 
But till this cosmic order everywhere 
Shatter'd into one earthquake in one day 
Cracks all to pieces, — and that hour perhaps 
Is not so far when momentary man 
Shall seem no more a something to himself, 



166 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

But he, his hopes and hates, his homes and 

fanes, 
And even his bones long laid within the 

grave. 
The very sides of the grave itself shall pass, 
Vanishing, atom and void, atom and void. 
Into the unseen forever, — till that hour, 
My golden work in which I told a truth 
That stays the rolling Ixionian wheel, 
That numbs the Fury's ringlet-snake, and 

plucks 
The mortal soul from out immortal hell. 
Shall stand : ay, surely : then it fails at last 
And perishes as I must; for O Thou, 
Passionless bride, divine Tranquillity, 
Yearn 'd after by the wisest of the wise. 
Who fail to find thee, being as thou art 
Without one pleasure and without one pain, 
Howbeit I know thou surely must be mine j 
Or soon or late, yet out of season, thus 1 

I woo thee roughly, for thou carest not ' 

How roughly men may woo thee so they win — 
Thus — thus: the soul flies out and dies in the 

air. * ' 

With that he drove the knife into his side : 
She heard him raging, heard him fall ; ran in, 
Beat breast, tore hair, cried out upon herself 
As having fail'd in duty to him, shriek'd 
That she but meant to win him back, fell on 

him, 
Clasp'd, kiss'd him, wail'd: he answer'd, 

"Care not thou! 
Thy duty? What is duty? Fare thee well!" 



AND OTHER POEMS. 167 



ODE ON THE DEATH OF THE DUKE 
OF WELLINGTON. 

PUBLISHED IN 1852. 
I. 

Bury the Great Duke 

With an empire's lamentation, 
Let us bury the Great Duke 

To the noise of the mourning of a mighty' 
nation, - 

Mourning when their leaders fall, 
Warriors carry the warrior's pall, 
And sorrow darkens hamlet and hall. 

II. 

Where shall we lay the man whom we deplore? 
Here, in streaming London's central roar. 
Let the sound of those he wrought for. 
And the feet of those he fought for, 
Echo round his bones for evermore. 

III. 

Lead out the pageant : sad and slow, 

As fits an universal woe, 

Let the long, long procession go. 

And let the sorrowing crowd about it grow, 

And let the mournful martial music blow ; 

The last great Englishman is low. 

IV. 

Mourn, for to us he seems the last. 
Remembering all his greatness in the Past. 



168 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

No more in soldier fashion will he greet 

With lifted hand the gazer in the street. 

O friends, our chief state-oracle is mute : 

Mourn for the man of long-enduring blood, 

The statesman-warrior, moderate, resolute, 

Whole in himself, a common good. 

Mourn for the man of amplest influence, 

Yet clearest of ambitious crime, 

Our greatest yet with least pretence, 

Great in council and great in war, 

Foremost captain of his time. 

Rich in saving con;mon-sense, 

And, as the greatelt only are, 

In his simplicity^sublime. 

O good grayj^iead which all men knew, 

O voice from which their omens all men drew, 

O iron nerve to true occasion true, 

O fall'n at length that tower of strength 

Which stood four-square to all the winds that 

blew! 
Such was he whom we deplore. 
The long self-sacrifice of life is o'er. 
The great World-victor's victor will be seen 

no more. 



All is over and done : 
Render thanks to the Giver, 
England, for thy son. 
Let the bell be toll'd. 
Render thanks to the Giver, 
And render him to the mould. 
Under the cross of gold 
That shines over city and river, 



AND OTHER POEMS. 169 

There he shall rest forever 

Among the wise and the bold. 

Let the bell betoll'd: 

And a reverent people behold 

The towering car, the sable steeds: 

Bright let it be with its blazon'd deeds, 

Dark in its funeral fold. 

Let the bell be toll'd: 

And a deeper knell in the heart be knoll'd; 

And the sound of the sorrowing anthem roll'd 

Thro' the dome of the golden cross; 

A^nd the volleying cannon thunder his loss; 

He knew their voices of old. 

For many a time in many a clime 

His captain's-ear has heard them boom 

Bellowing victory, bellowing doom: 

When he with those deep voices wrought, 

Guarding realms and kings from shame ; 

With those deep voices our dead captain taught 

The tyrant, and asserts his claim 

In that dread sound to the great name. 

Which he has worn so pure of blame, 

In praise and in dispraise the same, 

A man of well-attemper'd frame. 

O civic muse, to such a name, 

To such a name for ages long. 

To such a name, 

Preserve a broad approach of fame, 

And ever-echoing avenues of song. 

VI. 

Who is he that cometh, like an honor 'd guest. 

With banner and with music, with soldier and 

with priest, 
12 



170 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

With a nation weeping, and breaking on my 

rest? 
Mighty Seaman, this is he 
Was great by land as thou by sea. 
Thine island loves thee well, thou famous man 
The greatest sailor since our world began. 
Now, to the roll of muffled drums, 
To thee the greatest soldier comes; 
For this is he 

Was great by land as thou by sea; 
His foes were thine; he kept us free; 
O give him welcome, this is he 
Worthy of our gorgeous rites, j 

And worthy to be laid by thee ; 
For this is England's greatest son, 
He that gain'd a hundred fights, 
Nor ever lost an English gun ; 
This is he that far away 
Against the myriads of Assaye 
Clash'd with his fiery few and won; 
And underneath another sun. 
Warring on a later day. 
Round affrighted Lisbon drew 
The treble works, the vast designs 
Of his labor'd rampart-lines, 
Where he greatly stood at bay, 
Whence he issued forth anew. 
And ever great and greater grew, 
Beating from the wasted vines 
Back to France her banded swarms. 
Back to France with countless blows, 
Till o'er the hills her eagles flew 
Beyond the Pyrenean pines, 
Follow'd up in valley and glen 



AND OTHER POEMS. 171 

With blare of bugle, clamor of men, 

Roll of cannon and clash of arms, 

And England pouring on her foes. 

Such a war had such a close. 

Again their ravening eagle rose 

In anger, wheel'd on Europe-shadowing wings 

And barking for the thrones of kings; 

Till one that sought but Duty's iron crown 

On that loud sabbath shook the spoiler down; 

A day of onsets of despair ! 

Dash'd on every rocky square 

Their surging charges foam'd themselves 

away; 
Last, the Prussian trumpet blew; 
Thro' the long-tormented air 
Heaven flash'd a sudden jubilant ray, 
And down we swept and charged and over- 

threw. 
So great a soldier taught us there, 
What long-enduring hearts could do 
In that world-earthquake, Waterloo ! 
Mighty Seaman, tender and true, 
And pure as he from taint of craven guile> 
O savior of the silver-coasted isle, 
O shaker of the Baltic and the Nile, 
If aught of things that there befall 
Touch a spirit among things divine, 
If love of country move thee there at all, 
Be glad, because his bones are laid by thine! 
And thro' the centuries let a people's ypice 
In full acclaim, 
A people's voice, 

The proof and echo of all human fame, 
A people's voice, when they rejoice 



172 LOCKSLEY HALL. "; 

At civic revel and pomp and game, 
Attest their great commander's claim 
Witli honor, honor, honor, honor to him, 
Kternal honor to his name. 

VII. 

A people's voice! we are a people yet. 

Tho' all men else their nobler dreams forget, 

Confused by brainless mobs and lawless 

* Powers ; 
Thank Him who isled us here, and roughly set 
His Briton in blown seas and storming showers, 
"We have a voice, with which to pay the debt. 
Of boundless love and reverence and regret 
To those great men who fought, and kept it 

ours. 
And kept it ours, O God, from brute control; 
O Statesmen, guard us, guard the eye, the soul 
Of Europe, keep our noble England whole. 
And save the one true seed of freedom sown 
Betwixt a people and their ancient throne, 
That sober freedom out of which there springs 
Our loyal passion for our temperate kings ; 
Por, saving that, ye help to save mankind 
Till public wrong be crumbled into dust, 
And drill the raw world for the march of mind. 
Till crowds at length be sane and crowns be 

just. 
But wink no more in slothful overtrust. 
P^emember him who led your hosts; 
He had you guard the sacred coasts. 
Your cannons moulder on the seaward wall ; 
His voice is silent in your council-hall 
Forever; and whatever tempests lour 



AND OTHER POEMS. Vm 

Forever silent ; even if they broke 
In thunder, silent; yet remember all 
He spoke among you, and the Man who spoke; 
Who never sold the truth to serve the hour^ 
Nor palter' d v^rith Eternal God for power; 
Who let the turbid streams of rumor flow 
Thro' either babbling world of high and low; 
Whose life was work, whose language rife 
With rugged maxims hewn from life ; 
Who never spoke against a foe; 
Whose eighty winters freeze with one rebuke- 
All great self-seekers trampling on the right: 
Truth-teller was our England's Alfred named; 
Truth-lover was our English Duke; 
Whatever record leap to light 
He never shall be shamed. 

VIII. 

Lo, the leader in these glorious wars 

Now to glorious burial slowly borne. 

Follow 'd by the brave of other lands, 

He, on whom from both her open hands 

Lavish Honor shower'd all her stars. 

And affluent Fortune emptied all her horn. 

Yea, let all good things await 

Him who cares not to be great. 

But as he saves or serves the state. 

Not once or twice in our rough island-story^ 

The path of duty was the way to glory : 

He that walks it, only thirsting 

For the right, and learns to deaden 

Love of self, before his journey closes; 

He shall find the stubborn thistle bursting ■ 

Into glossy purples, which outredden 



j,|?4 LOCKSLEY HALL. 

All voluptuous garden -roses. 
Not once or twice in our fair island-stpry, ' 
Tbe^path of duty was the way to glory: 
'He, [that ever following her commands, 
On with toil of heart and knees and hands. 
Thro' the long gorge to the fair light has won 
Ifis path upward, and prevail'd, 
Shall find the toppling crags of Duty scaled 
Are close upon the shining table-lands 
To which our God Himself is mopn and sun. 
j§i;cji was he: his work is done, 
l^ut while the races of mankind endure, 
Xfit his great example stand 
Colossal, seen of every land, 
And keep the soldier firm, the statesman pure : 
Till in all lands and thro* all human story 
The path of duty be the way to glory : 
And let the land whose hearths he saved from 

shame 
For many and many an age proclaim 
At civic revel and pomp and game, 
And when the long-illumined cities flame. 
Their ever-loyal iron leader's fame, 
With honor, honor, honor, honor to him^ 
Eternal honor to his name. 

IX. 

Peace, his triumph will be sung 

By some yet unmoulded tongue 

Far on in summers that we shall not see : 

Peace, it is a day of pain 

For one about whose patriarchal knee 

Late the little children clung : 

<0 peace, it is a day of pain 



AND OTHER POEMS. 175 

For one, upon whose hand and heart and brain 

Once the weight and fate of Europe hung. 

Ours the pain, be his the gain ! 

More than is of man's degree 

Must be with us, watching here 

At this, our great solemnity. 

Whom we see not we revere ; 

We revere, and we refrain 

From talk of battles loud and vain, 

And brawling memories all too free 

For such a wise humility 

As befits a solemn fane : 

We revere, and while we hear 

The tides of Music's golden sea 

Setting toward eternity. 

Uplifted high in heart and hope are we, 

Until we doubt not that for one so true 

There must be other nobler work to do 

Than when he fought at Waterloo, 

And Victor he must ever be. 

For tho' the Giant Ages heave the hill 

And break the shore, and evermore 

Make and break, and work their will ; 

Tho' world on world in myriad myriads roll 

Round us, each with different powers. 

And other forms of life than ours. 

What know we greater than the soul? 

On God and Godlike men we build our trust 

Hush, the Dead March wails in the people's 

ears; 
The dark crowd moves, and there are sobs and 

tears : 
The black earth yawns : the mortal disappears ; 
Ashes to ashes, dust to dust ; 



176 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

He is gone who seem'd so great. — 

Gone ; but nothing can bereave him 

Of the force he made his own 

Being here, and we believe him 

Something far advanced in State, 

And that he wears a truer crown 

Than any wreath that man can weave him. 

Speak no more of his renown, 

Lay your earthly fancies down, 

And in the vast cathedral leave him. 

God accept him, Christ receive him. 



THE THIRD OF FEBRUARY, 1852. 

My Lords, we heard you speak : you told us all 
That England's honest censure went too far; 

That our free press should cease to brawl. 
Not sting the fiery Frenchman into war. 

It was our ancient privilege, my Lords, 

To fling what'er we felt, not fearing, into 
words. 

We love not this French God, the child of Hell, 
Wild War, who breaks the converse of the 
wise; 
But though we love kind Peace so well. 

We dare not e'vn by silence sanction lies. 
It might be safe our censures to withdraw ; 
And yet, my Lords, not well : there is a higher 
law. 

As long as we remain, we must speak free, 

Tho' all the storm of Europe on us break ; 
No little German state are we, 



AND OTHER POEMS. 177 

But the one voice in Europe : we must speak ; 
That if to-night our greatness were struck dead, 
There might be left some record of the things 
we said. 

If you be fearful, then must we be bold. 
Our Britain cannot salve a tyrant o'er. 

Better the waste Atlantic roll'd 

On her and us and ours for evermore. 

What ! have we fought for Freedom from our 
prime, 

At last to dodge and palter with a public crime? 

Shall we fear him? our own we never fear'd. 
From our first Charles by force we wrung 
our claims. 
Prick 'd by the Papal spur, we rear'd, 

We flung the burthen of the second James. 
I say, we never feared ! and as for these, 
We broke them on the land, we drove them on 
the seas. 

And you, my Lords, you make the people muse 
In doubt if you be of our Barons' breed — 

Were those your sires who fought at Lewes? 
Is this the manly strain of Runnymede? 

O fall'n nobility, that, overawed, 

Would lisp in honey'd whispers of this mon- 
strous fraud? 

We feel, at least, that silence here were sin. 
Not ours the fault if we have feeble hosts — 

If easy patrons of their kin 

Have left the last free race with naked coasts! 



178 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

They knew the precious things they had to 

guard : 
For us, we will not spare the tyrant one hard 

word. 

Tho' niggard throats of Manchester may bawl, 
What England was, shall her true sons forget? 

We are not cotton-spinners all, 

But some love England and her honor yet. 

And these in our Thermopylae shall stand, 

And hold against the world this honor of the 
land. 



THE CHARGE OF THE LIGHT BRI- 
GADE. 

I. 

Half a league, half a league, 
Half a league onward. 
All in the valley of Death 

Rode the six hundred. 
•'Forward, the Light Brigade! 
Charge for the guns!" he said: 
Into the valley of Death 

Rode the six hundred. 

II. 

•'Forward, the Light Brigade!*' 
Was there a man dismay 'd? 
Not tho* the soldier knew 

Some one had blunder'd: 
Their's not to make reply, 



AND OTHER POEMS. 179 

Their's not to reason why, 
Their's but to do and die : 
Into the valley of Death 
Rode the six hundred. 

III. ] 

Cannon to right of them, 

Cannon to left of them. 

Cannon in front of them , 

Volley'd and thunder'd; 
Storm 'd at with shot and shell, 
Boldly they rode and well, 
Into the jaws of Death, 
Into the mouth of Hell 

Rode the six hundred. 

IV. 

Flash 'd all their sabres bare, 
Flash 'd as they turn'd in air 
Sabring the gunners there, 
Charging an army, while 

All the world wonder'd: 
Plunged in the battery-smoke , 

Right thro' the line they broke; ! 

Cossack and Russian 
Reel'd from the sabre-stroke 

Shatter'd and sunder'd. 
Then they rode back, but not 

Not the six hundred. 

V. 

Cannon to right of them, 1 

Cannon to left of them, i 

Cannon behind them 



180 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

VoUey'd and thunder'd; 
Storm'd at with shot and shell, 
While horse and hero fell, 
They that had fought so well 
Came thro' the jaws of Death, 
Back from the mouth of Hell, 
All that was left of them, 

Left of six hundred. 

VI. 

When can their glory fade? 
O the wild charge they made! 

All the world wonder'd. 
Honor the charge they made! 
Honor the Light Brigade, 

Noble six hundred! 



ODE SUNG AT THE OPENING OF THE 
INTERNATIONAL EXHIBITION. 



Uplift a thousand voices full and sweet. 

In this wide hall with earth's invention 

stored, 
And praise the invisible universal Lord, 
Who lets once more in peace the nations meet, 
Where Science, Art, and Labor have out- 
pour'd 
Their myriad horns of plenty at our feet. 

II. 
O silent father of our Kings to be 
Mourn'd in this golden hour of jubilee, * 
For this, for all, we weep our thanks to thee ! 



AND OTHER POEMS. 181 



III. 



The world-compelling plan was thine, — 

And, lo! the long laborious miles 

Of Palace; lo! the giant aisles, 

Rich in model and design ; 

Harvest-tool and husbandry, 

Loom and wheel and enginery, 

Secrets of the sullen mine, 

Steel and gold, and corn and wine, 

Fabric rough, or fairy-fine. 

Sunny tokens of the Line, 

Polar marvels, and a feast 

Of wonder, out of West and East, 

And shapes and hues of Art divine! 

All of beauty, all of use, 

That one fair planet can produce. 

Brought from under every star. 
Blown from over every main. 
And mixt, as life is mixt with pain. 

The works of peace with works of war. 

IV. 

Is the goal so far away? 

Far, how far no tongue can say. 

Let us dream our dream to-day. 

V. 

O ye, the wise who think, the wise who reign, 
From growing commerce loose her latest chain. 
And let the fair white-wing'd peacemaker fly 
To happy havens under all the sky. 
And mix the seasons and the golden hours ; 
Till each man find his own in all men's good, 



182 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

And all men work in noble brotherhood, 
Breaking: their mailed fleets and armed towers^ 
And ruling by obeying Nature's powers, 
And gathering all the fruits of earth and 
crown 'd with all her flowers. 



A WELCOME TO ALEXANDRA. 

MARCH 7, 1863. 

Sea-kings' daughter from over the sea, 

Alexandra! 

Saxon and Norman and Dane are we, 

But all of us Danes in our welcome of thee, 

Alexandra! 

Welcome her, thunders of fort and of fleet ! 

Welcome her, thundering cheer of the street! 

Welcome her, all things youthful and sweet. 

Scatter the blossom under her feet ! 

Break, happy land, into earlier flowers! 

Make music, O bird, in the new-budded bowers! 

Blazon your mottoes of blessing and prayer! , 

Welcome her, welcome her, all that is ours! 

Warble, O bugle, and trumpet, blare ! 

Flags, flutter out upon turrets and towers! 

Flames, on the windy headland flare ! 

Utter your jubilee, steeple and spire! 

Clash, ye bells, in the merry March air! 

Flash, ye cities, in rivers of fire ! 

Rush to the roof, sudden rocket, and higher 

Melt into stars for the land's desire! 

Roll and rejoice, jubilant voice, 

Roll as a ground-swell dash'd on the strand, 



AND OTHER POEMS. 183 

Roar as the sea when he welcomes the land, 
And welcome her, welcome the land's desire, 
The sea-kings' daughter as happy as fair. 
Blissful bride of a blissful heir, 
Bride of the heir of the kings of the sea — 
O joy to the people and joy to the throne. 
Come to us, love us and make us your own : 
For Saxon or Dane or Norman we, 
Teuton or Celt, or whatever we be, 
We are each all Dane in our welcome of thee, 

Alexandra ! 



A WELCOME TO HER ROYAL HIGH- 
NESS MARIE ALEXANDROVNA, 
DUCHESS OF EDINBURGH. 

MARCH 7, 1874. 



The Son of him with whom we strove for 
power — 
Whose will is lord thro' all his world- 
domain — 
Who made the serf a man, and burst his 
chain — 
Has given our Prince his own imperial Flower, 

Alexandrovna. 
And welcome, Russian flower, a people's pride, 
To Britain, when her flowers begin to blow ! ' 
From love to love, from home to home you 
go, 
From mother unto mother, stately bride, 
Marie Alexandrovna! 



184 LOCKSLEY HALL, 



II. 



The golden news along- the steppes is blown, 
And at thy name the Tartar tents are stirr'd ; 
Elburz and all the Caucasus have heard; 

And all the sultry palms of India known, 

Alexandrovna. 

The voices of our universal sea 

On capes of Afric as on cliffs of Kent, 
The Maoris and that Isle of Continent, 

And loyal pines of Canada murmur thee, 
Marie Alexandrovna! 

III. 

Fair empires branching, both, in lusty life! — 

Yet Harold's England fell to^Norman swords ; 

Yet thine own land has bow'd to Tartar 

hordes 

Since English Harold gave its throne a wife, 

Alexandrovna! 
For thrones and peoples are as waifs that swing, 
And float or fall, in endless ebb and flow ; 
But who love best have best the grace to 
know 
That Love by right divine is deathless king, 
Marie Alexandrovna! 

IV. 

And Love has led thee to the stranger land, 
Where men are bold and strongly say their 

say;— 
See, empire upon empire smiles to-day, 
As thou with thy young lover hand in hand, 

Alexandrovna! 
So now thy fuller life is in the west. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 185 

Whose hand at home was gracious to thy 

poor: 
Thy name was blest within the narrow door; 
Here also, Marie, shall thy name be blest, 
Marie Alexandrovna ! 



V. 

Shall fears and jealous hatreds flame again? 
Or at thy coming. Princess, everywhere, 
The blue heaven break, and some diviner air 
Breathe thro' the world and change the hearts 
of men, 

Alexandrovna? 
But hearts that change not, love that cannot 
cease. 
And peace be yours, the peace of soul in soul ! 
And howsoever this wild world may roll. 
Between your peoples truth and manful peace, 
Alfred — Alexandrovna ! 



THE GRANDMOTHER. 



And Willy, my eldest-born, is gone, you say, 

little Anne? 
Ruddy and white, and strong on his legs, he 

looks like a man. 
And Willy's wife has written: she never was 

overwise, 
Never the wife for Willy: he wouldn't take my 

advice. 



186 LOCKSLEY HALL. 



II. 

For, Annie, you see, her father was not the 

man to save, 
Hadn't a head to manage, and drank himself 

into his grave. 
Pretty enough, very pretty ! but I was against 

it for one. 
Eh ! — but he wouldn't hear me — and Willy, you 

say, is gone. 

III. 

Willy, my beauty, my eldest-born, the flower 
of the flock ; 

Never a man could fling him : for Willy stood 
like a rock. 

*' Here's a leg for a babe of a week!" says doc- 
tor ; and he would be bound. 

There was not his like that year in twenty 
parishes round. 

IV. 

Strong of his hands, and strong on his legs, 

but still of his tongue ! 
I ought to have gone before him : I wonder he 

went so young. 
I cannot cry for him, Annie : I have not long 

to stay; 
Perhaps I shall see him the sooner, for he 

lived far away. 

v. 

Why do you look at me, Annie? you think i 
am hard and cold ; 



AND OTHER POEMS. 187 

But all my children have gone before me, I am 

so old : 
I cannot weep for Willy, nor can I weep for 

the rest; 
Only at your age, Annie, I could have wept 

with the best. 

VI. 

For I remember a quarrel I had with your 

father, my dear, 
All for a slanderous story, that cost me many 

a tear. 
I mean your grandfather, Annie : it cost me a 

world of woe. 
Seventy years ago, my darling, seventy years 

ago. 

VII. 

For Jenny, my cousin, had come to the place, 

and I knew right well 
That Jenny had tript in her time: I knew, but 

I would not tell. 
And she to be coming and slandering me, the 

base little liar! 
But the tongue is a fire as you know, my dear, 

the tongue is a fire. 

VIII. 

And the parson made it his text that week, 

and he said likewise. 
That a lie which is half a truth is ever the 

blackest of lies, 
That a lie which is all a lie may be met and 

fought with outright, 



188 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

But a lie which is part a truth is a harder mat- 
ter to fight. 

IX. 

And Willy had not been down to the farm for 

a week and a day; 
And all things look'd half-dead, the' it was the 

middle of May. 
Jenny, to slander me, who knew what Jenny 

had been! 
But soiling another, Annie, will never make 

oneself clean. 

X. 

And I cried myself well-nigh blind, and all of 

an evening late 
I climb'd to the top of the garth, and stood 

by the road at the gate. 
The moon like a rick on fire was rising over 

the dale, 
And whit, whit, whit, in the bush beside me 

chirrupt the nightingale. 

XI. 

All of a sudden he stopt : there past by the 

gate of the farm, 
Willy, — he didn't see me, — and Jenny hung 

on his arm. 
Out into the road I started, and spoke I 

scarce knew how; 
Ah, there's no fool like the old one — it makes 
me angry now. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 189 

XII. 

Willy stood up like a man, and look'd the thing 

that he meant; 
Jenny, the viper, made me a mocking curtsey 

and went. 
And I said, "Let us part: in a hundred years 

it'll all be the same, 
You cannot love me at all, if you love not my 

good name. " 

XIII. 

And he turn'd, and I saw his eyes all wet, in 

the sweet moonshine : 
"Sweetheart, I love you so well that your good 

name is mine. 
And what do I care for Jane, let her speak of 

you well or ill ; 
But marry me out of hand : we two shall be 

happy still." 

XIV. 

"Marry you, Willy!" said I, "but I needs 

must speak my mind, 
And I fear you'll listen to tales, be jealous and 

hard and unkind. ' ' 
But he turn'd and claspt me in his arms, and 

answer 'd, "No, love, no;" 
Seventy years ago, my darling, seventy years 

ago. 

XV. 

So Willy and I were wedded : I wore a lilac 
gown; 



190 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

And the ringers rang with a will, and he gave 

the ringers a crown. 
But the first that ever I bare was dead before 

he was born, 
Shadow and shine is life, little Annie, flower 

and thorn. 

XVI. 

That was the first time, too, that ever I thought 

of death. 
There lay the sweet little body that never had 

drawn a breath. 
I had not wept, little Anne, not since I had 

been a wife; 
But I wept like a child that day, for the babe 

had fought for his life. 

XVII. 

His dear little face was troubled, as if with 

anger or pain : 
I look'd at the still little body — his trouble had 

all been in vain. 
For Willy I cannot weep, I shall see him 

another morn : 
But I wept like a child for the child that was 

dead before he was born. 

XVIII. 

But he cheer'd me, my good man, for he sel- 
dom said me nay: 

Kind, like a man, was he; like a man, too, 
would have his way : 

Never jealous — not he : we had many a happy 
year; 



AND OTHER POEMS. 191 

And he died, and I could not weep — my own 
time seem'd so near. 

XIX. 

But I wish'd it had been God's will that I, too, 

then could have died: 
I began to be tired a little, and fain had slept 

at his side. 
And that was ten years back, or more, if I 

don't forget: 
But as to the children, Annie, they're all about 

me yet. 

XX. 

Pattering over the boards, my Annie who left 

me at two. 
Patter she goes, my own little Annie, an 

Annie like you: 
Pattering over the boards, she comes and goes 

at her will, 
While Harry is in the five-acre and Charlie 

ploughing the hill. 

XXI. 

.And Harry and Charlie I hear them too — they 

sing to their team : 
Often they come to the door in a pleasant kind 

of a dream. 
They come and sit by my chair, they hover 

about my bed — 
I am not always certain if they be alive or 

dead. 



192 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

XXII. 

And yet I know for a truth, there's none of 
them left alive ; 

For Harry went at sixty, your father at sixty- 
five: 

And Willy, my eldest-born, at nigh threescore 
and ten 

I knew them all as babies, and now they're 
elderly men. 

XXIII. 

For mine is a time of peace, it is not often I 

grieve ; 
I am oftener sitting at home in my father's 

farm at eve: 
And the neighbors come and laugh and gossip, 

and so do I ; 
I find myself often laughing at things that 

have long gone by. 

XXIV. 

To be sure the preacher says, our sins should 

make us sad: 
But mine is a time of peace, and there is Grace 

to be had; 
And God, not man, is the Judge of us all when 

life shall cease; 
And in this Book, little Annie, the message is 

one of Peace. 

XXV. 

And age is a time of peace, so it be free from 

pain, 




Why do you look at me, Annie?' "—Page 186. 

Locksley Hall. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 193 

And happy has been my life ; but I would not 

live it again. 
I seem to be tired a little, that's all, and long 

for rest ; 
Only at your age, Annie, I could have wept 

with the best. 

XXVI. 

So Willy has gone, my beauty, my eldest-born, 

my flower; 
But how can I weep for Willy, he has but gone 

for an hour, — 
Gone for a minute, my son, from this room 

into the next: 
I, too, shall go in a minute. What time have 

I to be vext? 

XXVII. 

And Willy's wife has written, she never was 

overwise. 
Get me my glasses, Annie : thank God that I 

keep my eyes. 
There is but a trifle left you, when I shall have 

past away. 
But stay with the old woman now ; you cannot 
have long to stay. 



13 Locksley Hall 



194 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

NORTHERN FARMER. 

OLD STYLE. 



Wheer 'asta bean saw long and mea liggin* 
'ere aloan? 

Noorse? thoort nowt o' a noorse: whoy, Doc- 
tor's abean an' agoan: 

Says that I moant 'a naw moor aale: but I 
beant a fool : 

Git ma my aale, fur I beant a-gooin' to break 
my rule. 



Doctors, they knaws nowt, fur a says what's 

nawways true : 
Naw soort o' koind o' use to saay the things 

that a do. 
I've 'ed my point o' aale ivry noight sin' I 

bean 'ere, 
An' I've 'ed my quart ivry market-noight for 

foorty year. 

in. 

Parson's a bean loikewoise, an' a sittin' ere o 

my bed. 
*'The amoighty's a taakin o' you to 'issen, my 

friend," a said, 
An' a towd ma my sins, an's toithe were due, 

an' I gied it in bond; 
I done moy duty boy 'um, as I 'a done boy the 

lond. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 195 



IV. 



Larn'd a ma' bea. I reckons I 'annot sa 

mooch to larn. 
But a cast oop, thot a did, 'boot Bessy Harris's 

barne. 
Thaw a knaws I hallus voated wi* Squoire an' 

choorch an' staate, 
An' i' the woost o' toimes I wur niver agin the 
raate. 

V. 

An' I hallus coom'd to *s choorch afoor moy 
Sally wur dead, 

An' 'eerd 'um a bummin' awaay loike a buz- 
zard-clock* ower my 'ead, 

An' I niver knaw'd whot a mean'd but I thowt 
a 'ad summut to saay, 

An' I thowt a said whot a owt to 'a said an* I 
coom'd awaay. 

VI. 

Bessy Harris's barne ! tha knaws she laaid it to 

mea. 
Howt a bean, mayhap, for she wur a bad un, 

shea, 
'Siver, I kep 'um, I ken 'um, my lass, tha 

mun understond; 
I done moy duty boy 'um as I 'a done boy the 

lond. 

VII. 

But Parson a cooms an' a goos, an* a says it 
easy an' freea 

*Cockchafer. 



196 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

**The amoighty's a taakin o' you to 'issen, my 

friend," says *ea. 
I weant saay men be loiars, thaw summun said 

it in 'aaste : 
But *e reads wonn sarmin a weeak, an' I 'a 

stubb'd Thurnaby waaste. 

VIII. 

D'ya moind the waaste, my lass? naw, naw, 

tha was not born then ; 
Theer wur a boggle in it, I often 'eerd 'um 

mysen; 
Moast loike a butter-bumb,* fur I 'eerd 'um 

aboot an' aboot. 
But I stubb'd 'um oop wi* the lot, an' raaved 

an' rambled 'um oot. 

IX. 

Keaper's it wur; fo'they fun *um theer a-laaid 

of 'is faace 
Doon i' the woild 'enemiesf afoor I coom'd to 

the plaace. 
Noaks or Thimbleby — toaner 'ed shot *um as 

dead as a naail. 
Noaks wur 'ang'd for it oop at 'soize — but git 

ma my aale. 

X. 

Dubbut loook at the waaste: theer warn't not 

f eead for a cow ; 
Nowt at all but bracken an' fuzz, an' loook at 

it now — 

* Bittern. t Anemones. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 197 

Warnt worth nowt a haacre, an' now theer's 

lots o' feead, 
Fourscoor yows upon it an' some on it doon i' 

seead. 

XI. 

Nobbut a bit on it's left, an* I mean'd to 'a 

stubb'd it at fall, 
Done it ta-year I mean'd, an' runn'd plow 

thruff it an' all. 
If godamoighty an' parson 'ud nobbut let ma 

aloan, 
Mea, wi' haate oonderd haacre o' Squoire's, 

an' lond o' m oan. 

XII. 

Do godamoighty knaw what a's doing a-taakin* 
o' mea? 

I beant wonn as saws 'ere abean an' yonder a 
pea; 

An* Squoire *ull be sa mad an' all — a' dear a* 
dear! 

And I 'a managed for Squoire coom Michael- 
mas thutty year. 

XIII. 

A mowt 'a taaen owd Joanes, as *ant nor a 

'aapoth o' sense. 
Or a mowt 'a taaen young Robins — a niver 

mended a fence: 
But godamoighty a moost taake mea an' taake 

ma now 
Wi* aaf the cows to cauve an' Thurnaby 

hoalms to plow ! 



198 LOCKSLEY HALL. 



XIV. 



Loook 'ow quoloty smoiles when they seeas ma 

a passin' boy, 
Says to thessen naw doubt **what a man a bea 

sewerloy ! ' ' 
Fur they knaws what I bean to Squoire sin 

fust a coom'd to the 'All; 
I done moy duty by Squoire an* I done moy 

duty boy hall. 

XV. 

Squoire's i' Lunnon, an* summun I reckons 

'ull 'a to wroite, 
For whoa's to howd the lond ater mea thot 

muddles ma quoit; 
Sartin-sewer I bea, thot a weant niver give it 

to Joanes, 
Naw, nor a moant to Robins — a niver rembles 

the stoans. 

XVI. 

But summun 'ull come ater mea mayhap wi* 

'is kittle o* steam 
Huzzin* an* maazin' the blessed fealds wi' the 

Divil's oan team. 
Sin' I mun doy I mun doy, thaw loife they 

says is sweet, 
But sin* I mun doy I mun doy, for I couldn 

abear to see it. 

XVII. 

What atta stannin' theer fur, an' doesn bring 
ma the aale? 



AND OTHER POEMS. 199 

Doctor's a 'toattler, lass, an a's hallus i' the 

owd taale ; 
I weant break rules fur Doctor, a knaws naw 

moor nor a floy ; 
Git ma my aale I tell tha, an' if I mun doy I 

mun doy. 



NORTHERN FARMER. 

NEW STYLE. 
I. 

Dosn't thou 'ear my 'erse's legs, as they can- 
ters awaay? 

Proputty, proputty, proputty — that's what I 
'ears 'em saay. 

Proputty, proputty, proputty — Sam, thou's an 
ass for thy paai'ns : 

Theer's moor sense i' one o* 'is legs nor in all 
thy braains. 

II. 

Woa — theer's a craw to pluck wi* tha, Sam : 

yon's parson's 'ouse — 
Dosn't thou knaw that a man mun be eather a 

man or a mouse? 
Time to think on it then ; for thou '11 be twenty 

to weeak.* 
Proputty, proputty — woa then woa — let ma 

'ear mysen speak. 

* This week. 



200 LOCKSLEY HALL, 



III. 

Me an' thy muther, Sammy, 'as bean a-talkin, 

o' thee; 
Thou's bean talkin* to muther, an' she bean a 

tellin' it me. 
Thou'll not marry for munny — thou's sweet 

upo' parson's lass — 
Noa — thou'll marry for luvv — an' we boath on 

us thinks tha an ass. 

IV. 

Seead her todaay goa by — Saaint's-daay — they 

was ringing the bells. 
She's a beauty thou thinks — an' soa is scoors 

o' gells. 
Them as 'as munny an' all — wot's a beauty? 

the flower as blaws. 
But proputty, proputty sticks, and proputty 

proputty graws. 

V. 

Do'ant be stunt:* taake time: I knaws what 

maakes tha sa mad. 
Warn't I craazed fur the lasses mysen when I 

wur a lad? 
But I knaw'd a Quaaker feller as often 'as 

towd ma this : 
^'Doant thou marry for munny, but goa wheer 



munny is! 



VI. 



An* I went wheer munny war: an' thy muther 
coom to 'and, 

* Obstinate. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 201 

Wi' lots o' munny laaid by, an' a nicetish bit 

o' land. 
Maaybe she warn't a beauty: — I niver giv it a 

thowt — 
But warn't she as good to cuddle an' kiss as a 

lass as 'ant nowt? 

VII. 

Parson's lass 'ant nowt, an* she weant 'a nowt 

when *e's dead, 
Mun be a guvness, lad, or summut, and addle* 

her bread: 
Why? fur 'e's nobbut a curate, an' weant niver 

git naw 'igher; 
An' 'e maade the bed as 'e ligs on afoor *e 

coom'd to the shire. 

VIII. 

An thin 'e coom'd to the parish wi' lots o* 

Varsity debt, 
Stook to his taail they did, an' 'e 'ant got shut 

on 'em yet. 
An' *e ligs on 'is back i' the grip, wi' noan to 

lend 'im a shove, 
Woorse nor a far-welter'df yowe : fur, Sammy, 

'e married fur luvv. 

IX. 

Luvv? what's luvv? thou can luvv thy lass an' 
'er munny too, 

* Earn. 

tOr fow-welter'd,— said of a sheep lying on its back 
in the furrow. 
14 



202 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Maakin' 'em goa togither as they've good 

right to do. 
Could'a T luvv thy muther by cause o' 'er 

munny laaid by? 
Naay — fur I luvv'd 'er a vast sight moor fur 

it: reason why. 

X. 

Ay an' thy muther says thou wants to marry 

the lass, 
Cooms of a gentleman burn: an' we boath on 

us thinks tha an ass. 
Woa then, proputty, wiltha? — an ass as near as 

mays nowt* — 
Woa then, wiltha? dangtha! — the bees is as 

fell as owtf. 

XI. 

Break me a bit o' the esh for his *ead lad, out 

o' the fence! 
Gentleman burn! what's gentleman burn? is it 

shillins an' pence? 
Proputty, proputty's ivrything 'ere, an', 

Sammy, I'm blest 
If it isn't the saame oop yonder, fur them as 

'as it's the best. 

XII. 

Tis'n them as 'as munny as breaks into 'ouses 

an' steals. 
Them as 'as coats to their backs an' taakes 

their regular meals. 

*Makes nothing. 

f The flies are as fierce as anything. 



AND OTHER POEMS. ^ 

Noa, but it's them as niver knaws wheer a 

meal's to be 'ad. 
Taake my word for it, Sammy, the poor in a 

loomp is bad. 

XIII. 

Them or thir feythers, tha sees, mun 'a bean 

a laazy lot, 
Fur work mun 'a gone to the gittin' whiniver 

munny was got. 
Feyther *ad ammost nowt; leastways 'is 

munny was 'id. 
But 'e tued an' moil'd 'issen dead, an 'e died a 

good un, 'e did. 

XIV. 

Loook thou theer wheer Wrigglesby beck 

cooms out by the 'ill ! 
Feyther run oop to the farm, an' I runs oop to 

the mill ; 
An' I'll run oop to the brig, an' that thou'U 

live to see ; 
And if thou marries a good un I'll leave the 

land to thee. 

XV. 

Thim's my noations, Sammy, wheerby I 
means to stick ; 

But if thou marries a bad un, I'll leave the 
land to Dick. — 

Coom oop, proputty, proputty — that's what I 
'ears 'im saay — 

Proputty, proputty, proputty — canter an' can- 
ter awaay. 



•204 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

THE DAISY. 

WRITTEN AT EDINBURGH. 

O love, what hours were thine and mine, 
In lands of palm and southern pine ; 

In lands of palm, of orange-blossom, 
Of olive, aloe, and maize and vine. 

What Roman strength Turbia show'd 
In ruin, by the mountain road ; 

How like a gem, beneath, the city 
Of little Monaco, basking, glow'd. 

How richly down the rocky dell . 
The torrent vineyard streaming fell 

To meet the sun and sunny waters, 
That only heaved with a summer swell. 

What slender campanili grew 

By bays, the peacock's neck in hue; 

Where, here and there, on sandy beaches 
A milky-bell'd amaryllis blew. 

How young Columbus seem'd to rove. 
Yet present in his natal grove, 

Now watching high in mountain cornice. 
And steering, now, from a purple cove, 

Now pacing mute by ocean's rim; 
Till, in a narrow street and dim, 

I stay'd the wheels at Cogoletto, 
And drank, and loyally drank to him. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 205 

Nor knew we well what pleased us most, 
Not the dipt palm of which they boast; 

But distant color, happy hamlet, 
A moulder'd citadel on the coast, 

Or tower, or high hill-convent, seen 
A light amid its olives green ; 

Or olive-hoary cape in ocean ; 
Or rosy blossom in hot ravine, 

Where oleanders flush'd the bed 
Of silent torrents, gravel-spread ; 

And, crossing, oft we saw the glisten 
Of ice, far up on a mountain head. 

We loved that hall, tho* white and cold 
Those niched shapes of noble mould, 
A princely people's awful princes, 
The grave, severe Genovese of old. 

At Florence too what golden hours, 
In those long galleries, were ours; 

What drives about the fresh Casine, 
Or walks in Boboli's ducal bowers. 

In bright vignettes, and each complete, 
Of tower or duomo, sunny- sweet, 

Or palace, how the city glitter'd, 
Thro' cypress avenues, at our feet. , ^ 

But when we crost the Lombard plain 
Remember what a plague of rain ; 

Of rain at Reggio, rain at Parma ; 
At Lodi, rain, Piacenza, rain. j, 



206 LOCKSLEY HALL. 

And stern and sad (so rare the smiles 
Of sunlight) look'd the Lombard piles; 

Porch-pillars on the lion resting, 
And somber, old, colonnaded aisles. 

Milan, O the chanting quires. 
The giant windows* brazon'd fires, 

The height, the space, the gloom, the glory! 
A mount of marble, a hundred spires ! 

1 climb'd the roofs at break of day; 
Sun-smitten Alps before me lay. 

I stood among the silent statues. 
And statued pinnacles, mute as they. 

How faintly-flush 'd, how phantom -fair; 
Was Monte Rosa, hanging there 

A thousand shadowy-pencil'd valleys 
And snowy dells in a golden air. 

Remember how we came at last 
To Como ; shower and storm and blast 
Had blown the lake beyond his limit 
And all was flooded ; and how we past 

From Como, when the light was gray, 
And in my head, for half the day, 

The rich Virgilian rustic measure 
Of Lari Maxume, all the way, 

Like ballad-burthen music, kept 
As on The Lariano crept 

To that fair port below the castle 
Of Queen Theodolind, where we slept; 



AND OTHER POEMS. 207 

Or hardly slept, but watch 'd awake 
A cypress in the moonlight shake, 

The moonlight touching o'er a terrace 
One tall Agave above the lake. 

What more? we took our last adieu, 
And up the snowy Splugen drew, 

But ere we reach'd the highest summit 
I pluck 'd a daisy, I gave it you. 

It told of England then to me. 
And now it tells of Italy. 

O love, we two shall go no longer 
To lands of summer across the sea ; 

So dear a life your arms enfold 
Whose crying is a cry for gold : 

Yet here to-night in this dark city, 
When ill and weary, alone and cold, 

I found, tho' crush 'd to hard and dry, 
This nursling of another sky 

Still in the little book you lent me, 
And where you tenderly laid it by: 

And I forgot the clouded Forth, 

The gloom that saddens Heaven and Earth 

The bitter east, the misty summer 
And gray metropolis of the North. 

Perchance, to lull the throbs of pain. 
Perchance, to charm a vacant brain, 

Perchance, to dream you still beside me. 
My fancy fled to the South again. 



LOCKSLEY HALL, 



TO THE REV. F. D. MAURICE. 

Come, when no graver cares employ, 
Godfather, come and see your boy: 

Your presence will be sun in winter, 
Making the little one leap for joy. 

For, being of that honest few. 
Who give the Fiend himself his due, 

Should eighty-thousand college-councils 
Thunder * 'Anathema," friend, at you; 

Should all our churchmen foam in spite 
At you, so careful of the right, 

Yet one lay-hearth would give you welcome 
(Take it and come) to the Isle of Wight ; 

Where, far from noise and smoke of town, 
I watch the twilight falling brown 

All round a careless-order' d garden 
Close to the ridge of a noble down. 

You'll have no scandal while you dine, 
But honest talk and wholesome wine, 

And only hear the magpie gossip 
Garrulous under a roof of pine : 

For groves of pine on either hand, 
To break the blast of winter, stand ; 

And further on, the hoary Channel 
Tumbles a billow on chalk and sand ; 

Where, if below the milky steep 
Some ship of battle slowly creep, 



AND OTHER POEMS. 209' 

And on thro' zones of light and shadow 
Glimmer away to the lonely deep, 

We might discuss the Northern sin 
Which made a selfish war begin ; 

Dispute the claims, arrange the chances;. 
Emperor, Ottoman, which shall win : 

Or whether war's avenging rod 
Shall lash all Europe into blood; 

Till you should turn to dearer matters, 
Dear to the man that is dear to God ; 

How best to help the slender store. 
How mend the dwellings of the poor; 

How gain in life, as life advances, 
Valor and charity more and more. 

Come, Maurice, come: the lawn as yet 
Is hoar with rime, or spongy- wet; 

But when the wreath of March has blos- 
som 'd, 
Crocus, anemone, violet. 

Or later, pay one visit here, 

For those are few we hold as dear ; 

Nor pay but one, but come for many, 
Many and many a happy year. 
January, 18^4. 



U LocksleyHall 



210 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

WILL. 

I. 

O well for him whose will is strong! 

He suffers, but he will not suffer long; 

He suffers, but he cannot suffer wrong : 

For him nor moves the loud world's random 

mock, 
Nor all Calamity's hugest waves confound, 
Who seems a promontory of rock, 
That, compass'd round with turbulent sound, 
In middle ocean meets the surging shock. 
Tempest-buffeted, citadel-crown'd. 



But ill for him who, bettering not with time, 
Corrupts the strength of heaven-descended 

Will, 
And ever weaker grows thro' acted crime, 
Or seeming-genial venial fault, 
Recurring and suggesting still! 
He seems as one whose footsteps halt, 
Toiling in immeasurable sand. 
And o'er a weary, sultry land, 
Far beneath a blazing vault. 
Sown in a wrinkle of the monstrous hill, 
The city sparkles like a grain of salt. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 211 



IN THE VALLEY OF CAUTERETZ. 

All along the valley, stream that flashest white, 
Deepening thy voice with the deepening of 

the night, 
All along the valley, where thy waters flow, 
I walk'd with one I loved two and thirty years 

ago. 
All along the valley, while I walk'd to-day, 
The two and thirty years were a mist that rolls 

away; 
For all along the valley, down thy rocky bed. 
Thy living voice to me was as the voice of the 

dead, 
And all along the valley, by rock and cave and 

tree, 
The voice of the dead was a living voice to me. 



IN THE GARDEN AT SWAINSTON. 

Nightingales warbled without, 

Within was weeping for thee: 
Shadows of three dead men 

Walk'd in the walks with me. 
Shadows of three dead men and thou wast 
one of the three. 

Nightingales sang in his woods: 

The Master was far away : 
Nightingales warbled and sang 

Of a passion that lasts but a day; 
Still in the house in his coffin the Prince of 
courtesy lay. 



212 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Two dead men have I known 

In courtesy like to thee : 
Two dead men have I loved 

With a love that ever will be : 
Three dead men have I loved and thou art 
last of the three. 



THE FLOWER. 

Once in a golden hour 
I cast to earth a seed. 

Up there came a flower, 
The people said, a weed. 

To and fro they went 
Thro' my garden-bower, 

And muttering discontent 
Cursed me and my flower. 

Then it grew so tall 

It wore a crown of light, 

But thieves from o'er the wall 
Stole the seed by night. 

Sow'd it far and wide 

By every town and tower, 

Till all the people cried, 
*' Splendid is the flower." 

Read my little fable ; 

He that runs may read. 
Most can raise the flowers now> 

For all have got the seed. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 213 

And some are pretty enough,^ 
And some are poor indeed; 

And now again the people 
Call it but a weed. 



REQUIESCAT. 

I^air is her cottage in its place, 

Where yon broad water sweetly slowly glides. 
It sees itself from thatch to base 

Dream in the sliding tides. 

And fairer she, but ah how soon to die ! 

Her quiet dream of life this hour may cease. 
Her peaceful being slowly passes by 

To some more perfect peace. 



THE SAILOR BOY. 

He rose at dawn and, fired with hope. 
Shot o'er the seething harbor-bar, 

And reach 'd the ship, and caught the rope, 
And whistled to the morning star. 

And while he whistled long and loud 
He heard a fierce mermaiden cry, 

*'0 boy, tho' thou art young and proud, 
I see the place where thou wilt lie. 

"The sands and yeasty surges mix 
In caves about the dreary bay. 

And on thy ribs the limpet sticks. 

And in thy heart the scrawl shall play." 



214 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

"Fool," he answered, "death is sure 
To those that stay and those that roam, 

But I will nevermore endure 

To sit with empty hands at home. 

"My mother clings about my neck, 
My sisters crying, 'Stay for shame;* 

My father raves of death and wreck. 

They are all to blame, they are all to blame. 

"God help me! save I take my part 

Of danger on the roaring sea, 
A devil rises in my heart, 

Far worse than any death to me." 



THE ISLET. 

"Whither, O whither, love, shall we go. 
For a score of sweet little summers or so?" 
The sweet little wife of the singer said. 
On the day that follow'd the day she was wed, 
"Whither, O whither, love, shall we go?" 
And the singer shaking his curly head 
Turn'd as he sat, and struck the keys 
There at his right with a sudden crash. 
Singing, "And shall it be over the seas 
With a crew that is neither rude nor rash. 
But a bevy of Eroses apple-cheek'd. 
In a shallop of crystal ivory-beak'd. 
With a satin sail of a ruby glow. 
To a sweet little Eden on earth that I know, 
A mountain islet pointed and peak'd; 
Waves on a diamond shingle dash, 



AND OTHER POEMS. 215 

Cataract brooks to the ocean run, 
Fairily-delicate palaces shine 
Mixt with myrtle and clad with vine, 
And overstream'd and silvery-streak 'd 
With many a rivulet hig^h against the Sun 
The facets of the glorious mountain flash 
Above the valleys of palm and pine. ' ' 

"Thither, O thither, love, let us go." 

"No, no, no! 

For in all that exquisite isle, my dear. 
There is but one bird with a musical throat. 
And his compass is but of a single note, 
That it makes one weary to hear." 

' ' Mock me not ! mock me not ! love, let us go. ' ' 

"No, love, no. 

For the bud ever breaks into bloom on the 

tree. 
And a storm never wakes on the lonely sea, 
And a worm is there in the lonely wood. 
That pierces the liver and blackens the blood; 
And makes it a sorrow to be. " 



216 LOCKSLEY HALL. 



CHILD -SONGS. 



I. 
THE CITY CHILD. 

Dainty little maiden, whither would you 
wander? 
Whither from this pretty home, the home 
where mother dwells? 
"Far and far away," said the dainty little 

maiden, 
"All among the gardens, auriculas, anemones, 
Roses and lilies and Canterbury-bells." 

Dainty little maiden, whither would you wan- 
der? 
Whither from this pretty house, this city- 
house of ours? 

"Far and far away," said the dainty little 
maiden, 

/'All among the meadows, the clover and the 
clematis, 
Daisies and kingcups and honeysuckle- 
flowers." 



AND OTHER POEMS. 217 



MINNIE AND WINNIE. 

Minnie and Winnie 

Slept in a shell. 
Sleep, little ladies! 

And they slept well. 

Pink was the shell within, 

Silver without; 
Sounds of the great sea 

Wander 'd about. 

Sleep, little ladies! 

Wake not soon ! 
Echo on echo 

Dies to the moon. 

Two bright stars 

Peep'd into the shell. 

**What are they dreaming of? 
Who can tell?" 

Started a green linnet 

Out of the croft ; 
Wake, little ladies. 

The sun is aloft ! 



218 LOCKSLEY HALL, 



THE SPITEFUL LETTER. 

Here, it is here, the close of the year, 

And with it a spiteful letter. 
My name in song has done him much wrong, 

For himself has done much better. 

little bard, is your lot so hard, 
If men neglect your pages? 

1 think not much of yours or of mine, 
I hear the roll of the ages. 

Rhymes and rhymes in the range of the times ! 

Are mine for the moment stronger? 
Yet hate me not, but abide your lot, 

I last but a moment longer. 

This faded leaf, our names are as brief; 

What room is left for a hater? 
Yet the yellow leaf hates the greener leaf, 

For it hangs one moment later. 

Greater than I — is that your cry? 

And men will live to see it. 
Well — if it be so — so it is, you know ; 

And if it be so, so be it. 

Brief, brief is a summer leaf, 

But this is the time of hollies. 
O hollies and ivies and evergreens, 

How I hate the spites and the follies ! 



AND OTHER POEMS. 219 

LITERARY SQUx\BBLES. 

Ah God ! the petty fools of rhyme 
That shriek and sweat in pigmy wars 

Before the stony face of Time, 
And look'd at by the silent stars: 

Who hate each other for a song, 

And do their little best to bite 
And pinch their brethren in the throng, 

And scratch the very dead for spite : 

And strain to make an inch of room. 

For their sweet selves, and cannot hear 
The sullen Lethe rolling doom 

On them and theirs and all things here : 

When one small touch of Charity 
Could lift them nearer God-like state 

Than if the crowded Orb should cry 
Like those who cried Diana great: 

And I too, talk, and lose the touch 

I talk of. Surely, after all. 
The noblest answer unto such 

Is perfect stillness when they brawl. 



THE VICTIM. 
I. 

A plague upon the people fell, 
A famine after laid them low. 

Then thorpe and byre arose in fire, 
For on them brake the sudden foe 



220 LOCKSLEY HALL. . 

So thick they died the people cried, 

"The Gods are moved against the land. 
The Priest in horror about his altar 
To Thor and Odin lifted a hand: 

"Help us from famine 

And plague and strife ! 

What would you have of us? 

Human life? 

Were it our nearest, 

Were it our dearest, 

(Answer, O answer) 

We give you his life." 



But still the foeman spoil'd and burn'd, 

And cattle died, and deer in wood. 
And bird in air, and fishes turn'd 

And whiten'd all the rolling flood; 
And dead men lay all over the way, 

Or down in a furrow scathed with flame: 
And ever and aye the Priesthood moan'd, 
Till at last it seem'd that an answer came. 
"The King is happy 
In child and wife; 
Take you his dearest, 
Give us a life." 

III. 

The Priest went out by heath and hill; 

The King was hunting in the wild; 
They found the mother sitting still ; 

She cast her arms about the child. 
The child was only eight summers old. 

His beauty still with his years increased, 



AND OTHER POEMS. 221 

His face was ruddy, his hair was gold, 
He seem'd a victim due to the priest. 
The Priest beheld him, 
And cried with joy, 
'*The Gods have answer'd: 
We give them the boy. ' ' 

IV. 

The King return'd from out the wild, 

He bore but little game in hand; 
The mother said, "They have taken the child 

To spill his blood and heal the land: 
The land is sick, the people diseased, 

And blight and famine on all the lea: 
The holy Gods, they must be appeased, 
So I pray you tell the truth to me. 
They have taken our son, 
They will have his life. 
Is he your dearest? 
Or I, the wife?" 

V. 

The King bent low, with hand on brow, 

He stay'd his arms upon his knee: 
*'0 wife, what use to answer now? 

For now the Priest has judges for me." 
The King was shaken with holy fear; 
**The Gods," he said, "would have chosen 

well; 
Yet both are near, and both are dear, 
And which the dearest I cannot tell!" 
But the Priest was happy, 
His victim won: 
"We have his dearest, 
His only son!" 



'222 LOCKSLEY HALL. 



VI. 



The rites prepared, the victim bared, 
The knife uprising toward the blow 
To the altar-stone she sprang alone, 

"Me, not my darling, no!" 
He caught her away with a sudden cry; 

Suddenly from him brake his wife, 
And shrieking "I am his dearest, I — 
I am his dearest!" rush'd on the knife. 
And the Priest was happy, 
"0,Father Odin, 
We give you a life. 
Which was his nearest? 
Who was his dearest? 
The Gods have answer'd; 
We give them the wife!" 

WAGES. 

Glory of warrior, glory of orator, glory of song. 
Paid with a voice flying by to be lost on an 
endless sea — 
Glory of Virtue, to fight, to struggle, to right 
the wrong — 
Nay, but she aim'd not at glory, no lover of 
glory she : 
Give her the glory of going on, and still to be. 

The wages of sin is death : if the wages of Vir- 
tue be dust. 
Would she have heart -to endure for the life 
of the worm and the fly? 

She desires no isles of the blest, no quiet seats 
of the just. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 223 

To rest in a golden grove, or to bask in a 
summer sky: 
Give her the wages of going on, and not to die. 



THE HIGHER PANTHEISM. 

The sun, the moon, the stars, the seas, the 

hills and the plains — 
Are not these, O Soul, the Vision of Him who 
reigns? 

Is not the Vision He? tho' Hebe not that which 

He seems? 
Dreams are true while they last, and do we 

not live in dreams? 

Earth, these solid stars, this weight of body 

and limb. 
Are they not sign and symbol of thy division 

from Him? 

Dark is the world to thee : thyself art the rea- 
son why : 

For is He not all but thou, that hast power to 
feel ''I am I?" 

Glory about thee,, without thee; and thou ful- 

filest thy doom 
Making Him broken gleams, and a stifled 

splendor and gloom. 

Speak to Him thou, for He hears, and Spirit 

with Spirit can meet — 
Closer is He than breathing, and nearer than 

hands and feet. 



224 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

God is law, say the wise ; O Soul, and let us 

rejoice, 
For if He thunder by law the thunder is yet 

His voice. 

Law is God, say some : no God at all, says the 

fool; 
For all we have the power to see is a straight 

staff bent in a pool ; 

And the ear ot man cannot hear, and the eye of 

man cannot see; 
But if we could see and hear, this Vision — 

were it not He? 



THE VOICE AND THE PEAK. 



The voice and the Peak 

Far over summit and lawn, 
The lone glow and long roar 

Green-rushing from the rosy thrones of 
dawn ! 

II. 

All night have I heard the voice 

Rave over the rocky bar, 
But thou wert silent in heaven, 

Above thee glided the star. 

III. 

Hast thou no voice, O Peak, 
That standest high above all? 



AND OTHER POEMS. 225 

"I am the voice of the Peak, 
I roar and rave for I fall. 

IV. 

*'A thousand voices go 

To North, South, East, and West ; 
They leave the heights and are troubled, 

And moan and sink to their rest. 

V. 

*'The fields are fair beside them. 
The chestnut towers in his bloom ; 

But they — they feel the desire of the deep — 
Fall, and follow their doom. 

VI. 

*'The deep has power on the height, 
And the height has power on the deep; 

They are raised for ever and ever. 
And sink again into sleep. ' ' 

•>. 

VII. 

Not raised for ever and ever, 

But when their cycle is o'er, 
The valley, the voice, the peak, the star 

Pass, and are found no more. 

VIII. 

The Peak is high and flush'd 

At his highest with sunrise fire; 
The Peak is high, and the stars are high. 

And the thought of a man is higher. 

15 LocksleyHall 



223 LOCKSLEY HALL, 



IX. 

A deep below the deep, 

And a height beyond the height! 
Our hearing is not hearing, 

And our seeine is not sisfht. 



The voice and the peak 

Far into heaven withdrawn, 
The lone glow and long roar 

Green-rushing from the rosy thrones of 
dawn! 



( 



"FLOWER IN THE CRANNIED WALL." 

Flower in the crannied wall, 

I pluck you out of the crannies, 

I hold 5^ou here, root and all, in my hand, 

Little flower — but if I could understand 

What 3^ou are, root and all, and all in all, 

I should know what God and man i^ ^ 



A DEDICATION. 

Dear, near and true — no truer Time himself 
Can prove you, tho' he make you evermore 
Dearer and nearer, as the rapid of life 
Shoots to the fall — take this and pray that he 
Who wrote it, honoring your sweet faith in 

him, 
May trust himself; and after praise and scorn, 
As one who feels the immeasurable world, 



AND OTHER POEMS. 227 

Attain the wise indifference of the wise; 
And after Autumn past — if left to pass 
His autumn into seeing-leafless days — 
Draw toward the long frost and longest night, 
Wearing his wisdom lightly, like the fruit 
Which in our winter woodland looks a flower.* 

*The fruit of the Spindle-tree (Euonymus Europaeus). 



LOCKSLEY HALL. 



EXPERIMENTS. 



BOADICEA. 

While about the shore of Mona those Neronian 
legionaries 

Burnt and broke the grove and altar of the 
Druid and Druidess, 

Far in the East Boadicea, standing loftily 
charioted, 

Mad and maddening all that heard her in her 
fierce volubility, 

Girt by half the tribes of Britain, near the col- 
ony Camulodune, 

Yell'd and shriek'd between her daughters o'er 
a wild confederacy. 

'*They that scorn the tribes and call us 

Britain's barbarous populaces, 
Did they hear me, would they listen, did they 

pity me supplicating? 
Shall I heed them in their anguish? shall I 

brook to be supplicated? 
Hear Icenian, Catieuchlanian, hear Coritanian, 

Trinobant! 
Must their ever-raveninq: easj-le's beak and 

talon annihilate us? 



AND OTHER POEMS. 229 

Tear the noble heart of Britain, leave it gorily 

quivering? 
Bark an answer, Britain's raven! bark and 

blacken innumerable, 
Blacken round the Roman carrion, make the 

carcase a skeleton. 
Kite and kestrel, wolf and wolfkin, from the 

wilderness, wallow in it, 
Till the face of Bel be brighten'd, Taranis be 

propitiated. 
Lo their colony half-defended! lo their colony, 

Camulodune! 
There the horde of Roman robbers mock at a 

barbarous adversary. 
There the hive of Roman liars worship a glut- 
tonous emperor-idiot. 
Such is Rome, and this her deity: hear it. 

Spirit of Cassivelaun ! 

*'Hear it, Gods! the Gods have heard it, O 

Icenian, O Coritanian! 
Doubt not ye the Gods have answer'd, Ca- 

tieuchlanian, Trinobant. 
These have told us all their anger in miraculous 

utterances, 
Thunder, a flying fire in heaven, a murmur 

heard aerially. 
Phantom sound of IdIows descending, moan of 

an enemy massacred, 
Phantom wail of women and children, multi- 
tudinous agonies. 
Bloodily flow'd the Tamesa rolling phantom 

bodies of horses and men; 

16 



230 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Then a phantom colony smoulder'd on the 
refluent estuary; 

Lastly yonder yester-even, suddenly giddily 
tottering — 

There was one who watch'd and told me — 
down their statue of Victory fell. 

Lo their precious Roman bantling, lo the col- 
ony Camulodune, 

Shall we teach it a Roman lesson? shall we 
care to be pitiful? 

Shall we deal with it as an infant? shall we 
dandle it amorously? 

"Hear Icenian, Catieuchlanian, hear Cori- 
tanian, Trinobant! 

While I roved about the forest, long and bit- 
terly meditating, 

There I heard them in the darkness, at the 
mystical ceremony, 

Loosely robed in flying raiment, sang the ter- 
rible prophetesses, 

'Fear not, isle of blowing woodland, isle of 
silvery parapets! 

Tho' the Roman eagle shadow thee, tho' the 
gathering enemy narrow thee, 

Thou shalt wax and he shall dwindle, thou 
shalt be the mighty one yet! 

Thine the liberty, thine the glory, thine the 
deeds to be celebrated, jk 

Thine the myriad-rolling ocean, light and 
shadow illimitable, 

Thine the lands of lasting summer, many-blos- 
soming Paradises, 



AND OTHER POEMS. 231 

Thine the North and thine the South and thine 

the battle-thunder of God.' 
So they chanted : how shall Britain light upon 

auguries happier? 
So they chanted in the darkness, and there 

Cometh a victory now. 

"Hear Icenian, Catieuchlanian, hear Cori- 

tanian, Trinobant! 
Me the wife of rich Prasutagus, me the lover 

of liberty, 
Me they seized and me they tortured, me they 

lash'd and humiliated. 
Me the sport of ribald Veterans, mine of ruffian 

violators! 
See they sit, they hide their faces, miserable 

in ignominy! 
Wherefore in me burns an anger, not by blood 

to be satiated. 
Lo the palaces and the temple, lo the colony 

Camulodune ! 
There they ruled, and thence they wasted all 

the flourishing territory, 
Thither at their will they haled the yellow- 
ringleted Britoness — 
Bloodily, bloodily fall the battle-axe, unex- 
hausted, inexorable. 
Shout Icenian, Catieuchlanian, shout Cori- 

tanian, Trinobant, 
Till the victim hear within and yearn to hurry 

precipitously 
Like the leaf in a roaring whirlwind, like the 

smoke in a hurricane whirl' d. 



^22 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

I^o the colony, there they rioted in the city of 

Cunobeline ! 
There they drank in cups of emerald, there at 

tables of ebony lay, 
Rolling on their purple couches in their tender 

effeminacy. 
There they dwelt and there they rioted ; there 

— there — they dwell no more. 
Burst the gates, and burn the palaces, break 

the works of the statuary, 
Take the hoary Roman head and shatter it, 

hold it abominable, 
Cut the Roman boy to pieces in his lust and 

voluptuousness. 
Lash the maiden into swooning, me they lash'd 

and humiliated, 
Chop the breasts from off the mother, dash the 

brains of the little one out. 
Up my Britons, on my chariot, on my chargers, 

trample them under us." 

So the Queen Boadicea, standing loftily char- 
ioted. 

Brandishing in her hand a dart and rolling 
glances lioness-like, 

Yell'd and shriek 'd between her daughters in 
her fierce volubility. 

Till her people all around the royal chariot 
agitated. 

Madly dash'd the darts together, writhing 
barbarous lineaments, 

Made the noise of frosty woodlands, when they 
shiver in January, 



AND OTHER POEMS. 233 

Roar'd as when the roaring breakers boom 
and blanch on the precipices, 

Yeird as when the winds of winter tear an oak 
on a promontory. 

So the silent colony hearing her tumultuous 
adversaries 

Clash the darts and on the buckler beat with 
rapid unanimous hand, 

Thought on all her evil tyrannies, all her piti- 
less avarice, 

Till she felt the heart within her fall and flut- 
ter tremulously, 

Then her pulses at the clamoring of her enemy 
fainted away. 

Out of evil evil flourishes, out of tyranny 
tyranny buds. 

Ran the land with Roman slaughter, multitud- 
inous agonies. 

iPerish'd many a maid and matron, many a 
valorous legionary, 

t'ell the colony, city, and citadel, London, 
Verulam, Camulodune. 



IN QUANTITY. 

ON TRANSLATIONS OF HOMER. 

Hexameters and Pentameters. 

These lame hexameters the strong-wing'd 
music of Homer! 
No — but a most burlesque barbarous experi- 
ment. 

When was a harsher sound ever heard, ye 
Muses, in England? 



234 LOCKSLEY HALL. 

When did a frog coarser croak upon our 
Helicon? 
Hexameters no worse than daring Germany 
gave us 

Barbarous experiment, barbarous hexam- 
eters. 



MILTON. 

Alcaics. 

O mighty-mouth 'd inventor of harmonies, 
O skill'd to sing of Time or Eternity, 
God-gifted organ- voice of England, 
Milton, a name to resound for ages; 
Whose Titan angels, Gabriel, Abdiel, 
Starr 'd from Jehovah's gorgeous armories. 
Tower, as the deep-doomed empyrean 
Rings to the roar of an angel onset — 
Me rather all that bowery loneliness. 
The brooks of Eden mazily murmuring. 
And bloom profuse and cedar arches 
Charm, as a wanderer out in ocean. 
Where some refulgent sunset of India 
Streams o'er a rich ambrosial ocean isle. 
And crimson-hued the stately palm-woods 
Whisper in odorous heights of even. 

Hendecasyllabics. 

O you chorus of indolent reviewers. 
Irresponsible, indolent reviewers, 
Look, I come to the test, a tiny poem 
All composed in a meter of Catullus, 
All in quantity, careful of my motion, 



AND OTHER POExMS. 235 

Like the skater on ice that hardly bears him, 
Lest I fall unawares before the people, 
Waking laughter in indolent reviewers. 
Should I flounder awhile without a tumble 
Thro' this metrification of Catullus. 
They should speak to me not without a wel- 
come. 
All that chorus of indolent reviewers. 
Hard, hard, hard is it, only not to tumble, 
So fantastical is the dainty meter. 
Wherefore slight me not wholly, nor believe 

me 
Too presumptuous, indolent reviewers. 
O blatant Magazines, regard me rather — 
Since I blush to belaud myself a moment — 
As some rare little rose, a piece of inmost 
Horticultural art, or half coquette-like 
Maiden, not to be greeted unbenignly. 



SPECIMEN OF A TRANSLATION OF 
THE ILIAD IN BLANK VERSE. 

So Hector spake; the Trojans roar'd applause; 
Then loosed their sweating horses from the 

yoke. 
And each beside his chariot bound his own; 
And oxen from the city, and goodly sheep 
In haste they drove, and honey-hearted wine 
And bread from out the houses brought, and 

heap'd 
Their firewood, and the winds from oflF the 

plain 
Roll'd the rich vapor far into the heaven. 



20G LOCKSLEY HALL, 

And these all night upon the bridge* of war 
Sat glorying; many a fire before them blazed: 
As when in heaven the stars about the moon 
Look beautiful, when all the winds are laid, 
And every height comes out, and jutting peak 
And valley, and the immeasurable heavens 
Break open to their highest, and all the stars 
Shine, and the Shepherd gladdens in his 

heart: 
So many a fire between the ships and stream 
Of Xanthus blazed before the towers of Troy, 
A thousand on the plain ; and close by each 
Sat fifty in the blaze of burning fire; 
And eating hoary grain and pulse the steeds, 
Fixt by their cars, waited the golden dawn. 

— Iliad viii. 542-561. 



■Or ridge. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 237 



THE WINDOW. 

OR, THE SONG OF THE WRENS. 

Four years ago Mr. SuHivan requested me to write a 
little song-cycle, German fashion, for him to exercise 
his art upon. He had been very successful in setting 
such old songs as "Orpheus with his lute," and I drest 
up for him, partly in the old style, a puppet, whose 
almost only merit is, perhaps, that it can dance to Mr. 
Sullivan's instrument. I am sorry that my four-year- 
old puppet should have to dance at all in the dark 
shadow of these days ; but the music is now completed, 
and I am bound by my promise. 

December, 1870. A. Tennyson. 



THE WINDOW. 

ON THE HILL. 

The lights and shadows fly ! 
Yonder it brightens and darkens down on the 
plain. 
A jewel, a jewel dear to a lover's eye! 
Oh is it the brook, or a pool, or her window- 
pane. 
When the winds are up in the morning? 

Clouds that are racing above, 
And winds and lights and shadows that cannot 
be still, 
All running on one way to the home of my 
love, 
You are all running on, and I stand on the 
slope of the hill, 
And the winds are up in the morning ! 



238 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Follow, follow the chase ! 
And my thoughts are as quick and as quick, 
ever on, on, on. 
O lights, are you flying over her sweet little 
face? 
And my heart is there before you are come, 
and gone, 
When the winds are up in the morning! 

Follow them down the slope! 
And I follow them down to the window-pane 
of my dear, 
And it brightens and darkens and brightens 
like my hope, 
And it darkens and brightens and darkens like 
my fear. 
And the winds are up in the morning. 

AT THE WINDOW. 

Vine, vine and eglantine. 
Clasp her window, trail and twine! 
Rose, rose and clematis. 
Trail and twine and clasp and kiss. 
Kiss, kiss; and make her a bower 
All of flowers, and drop me a flower, 
Drop me a flower. 

Vine, vine and eglantine. 
Cannot a flower, a flower, be mine? 
Rose, rose and clematis, 
Drop me a flower, a flower, to kiss, 
Kiss, kiss — and out of her bower 
All of flowers, a flower, a flower, 
Dropt, a flower. 



AND OTHER POEMS. 239 

GONE. 

Gone! 

Gone, till the end of the year, 

Gone, and the light gone with her, and left 

me in shadow here ! 

Gone — flitted away, 
Taken the stars from the night and the sun 

from the day! 
Gone, and a cloud in my heart, and a storm in 

the air! 
Flown to the east or the west, flitted I know 

not where ! 
Down in the south is a flash and a groan • she 

is there ! she is there ! 

WINTER. 

The frost is here, 

And fuel is dear, 

And woods are sear, 

And fires burn clear, 

And frost is here 

And has bitten the heel of the going year. 

Bite, frost, bite! 

You roll up away from the light 

The blue wood-louse, and the plumb dormouse, 

And the bees are still'd, and the flies are kill'd, 

And you bite far into the heart of the house, 

But not into mine. 

Bite, frost, bite! 

The woods are all the searer. 

The fuel is all the dearer. 



240 LOCKSLEYHALL, 

The fires are all the clearer, 

My spring is all the nearer, 

You have bitten into the heart of the earth, 

But not into mine. 

SPRING. 

Birds* love and birds' song 

Flying here and there, 
Birds' song and birds' love, 

And you with gold for hair? 
Birds' song and birds' love, 

Passing with the weather, 
Men's song and men's love, 

To love once and forever. 

Men's love and birds' love, 

And women's love and men's! 
And you my wren with a crown of gold, 

You my queen of the wrens ! 
You the queen of the wrens — 

We'll be birds of a feather, 
I'll be King of the Queen of the wrens, 

And all in a nest together. 

THE LETTER. 

Where is another sweet as my sweet, 
Fine of the fine, and shy of the shy? 

Fine little hands, fine little feet — 
Dev^y blue eye. 

Shall I write to her? shall I go? 
Ask her to marry me by and by? 



AND OTHER POEMS. 241 

Somebody said that she'd say no; 
Somebody knows that she'll say ay! 

Ay or no, if ask'd to her face? 

Ay or no, from shy of the shy? 
Go, little letter, apace, apace. 

Fly; 

Fly to the light in the valley below — 
Tell my wish to her dewy blue eye: 

Somebody said that she'd say no; 
Somebody knows that she'll say ay! 

NO ANSWER. 

The mist and the rain, the mist and the rain! 

Is it ay or no? is it ay or no? 
And never a glimpse of her window pane! 

And I may die but the grass will grow, 
And the grass will grow when I am gone. 
And the wet west wind and the world will go 
on. 

Ay is the song of the wedded spheres, 
No is trouble and cloud and storm, 

Ay is life for a hundred years, 

No will push me down to the worm, 

And when I am there and dead and gone, 

The wet west wind and the world will go on. 

The wind and the wet, the wind and the wet! 

Wet west wind how you blow, you blow ! 
And never a line from my lady yet! 

Is it ay or no? is it ay or no? 

16 LocksleyHall 



242 LOCKSLEY HALL, 

Blow then, blow, and when I am gone, 

The wet west wind and the world may go on. 

NO ANSWER. 

Winds are loud and you are dumb, 
Take my love, for love will come. 

Love will come but once a life. 
Winds are loud and winds will pass! 
Spring is here with leaf and grass: 

Take my love and be my wife. 
After-loves of maids and men 
Are but dainties drest again: 
Love me now, you'll love me then: 

Love can love but once a life. 

THE ANSWER. 

Two little hands that meet, 
Claspt on her seal, my sweet! 
Must I take you and break you, 
Two little hands that meet? 
I must take you, and break you. 
And loving hands must part — 
Take, take — break, break — 
Break — you may break my heart. 
Faint heart never won — 
Break, break, and all's done. 



AY. 

Be merry, all birds, to-day, 

Be merry on earth as you never were merry 
before. 
Be merry in heaven, O larks, and far away, 



AND OTHER POEMS. 243 

And merry for ever and ever, and one day- 
more. 

Why? 
For it's easy to find a rhyme. 
Look, look, how he flits, 

The fire crown 'd king of the wrens, from 
out of the pine! 
Look how they tumble the blossom, the mad 
little tits! 
*'Cuck-oo! Cuck-oo!" was ever a May so fine? 
Why? 
For it's easy to find a rhyme. 
O merry the linnet and dove, 

And swallow and sparrow and throstle, and 
have your desire ! 
O merry my heart, you have gotten the wings 
of love, 
And flit like the king of the wrens with a 
crown of fire. 

Why? 
For it's ay ay, ay ay. 

WHEN. 

Sun comes, moon comes. 

Time slips away. 
Sun sets, moon sets, 

Love, fix a day. 

*'A year hence, a year hence." 

"We shall both be gray." 
"A month hence, a month hence." 

"Far, far away." 

"A week hence, a week hence." 
"Ah, the long delay." 



244 LOCKSLEY HALL. 



**Wait a little, wait a little, 
You shall fix a day. ' ' 

"To-morrow, love, to-morrow, 

And that's an age away. " 
Blaze upon her window, sun, 
And honor all the day. 

MARRIAGE MORNING. 

Light, so low upon earth, 

You send a flash to the sun. 
Here is the golden close of love, 

All my wooing is done. 
Oh, the woods and the meadows. 

Woods where we hid from the wet, 
Stiles where we stay'd to be kind, 

Meadows in which we met! 
Light, so low in the vale 

You flash and lighten afar. 
For this is the golden morning of love, 

And you are his morning star. 
Flash, I am coming, I come. 

By meadow and stile and wood, 
Oh, lighten into my eyes and my heart. 

Into my heart and my blood! 
Heart, are you great enough 

For a love that never tires? 
O heart, are you great enough for love? 

I have heard of thorns and briers. 
Over the thorns and briers, 

Over the meadows and stiles, 
Over the world to the end of it 

Flash for a million miles. 



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Kipling 

101. Pleasures of Life Lubbock 

102. Prince of the House of David 

Ingraham 

103. Princess Tennyson 

104. Prueand I Curtis 

107. Queen of the Air Raskin 

110. Rab and His Friends. . . Brown 

111. Representative Men . . Emerson 

112. Reveries of a Bachelor 

Mitchell 

113. Rollo in Geneva Abbott 

114. Rollo in Holland Abbott 

116. Rollo in London Abbott 

118. Rollo in Naples Abbott 

117. Rollo in Paris Abbott 

118. Rollo in Rome Abbott 

119. Rollo in Scotland Abbott 

120. Rollo in Switzerland... Abbott 

121. Rollo on the Atlantic. .Abbott 

122. Rollo on the Rhine Abbott 

123. Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam 

Fitzgerald 

128. Sartor Resartua Carlyle 

129. Scarlet Letter Hawthorne 

130 Sesame and Lilies Raskin 

181. Sign of the Four Doyle 

132. Sketch Book Irving 

133. Stickit Minister Crockett 

140. Tales from Shakespeare 

C. and Mary Lamb 

141. Tanglewood Tales.. Hawthorne 

142. True and Beautiful Ruskin 

143. Three Men in a Boat. ..Jerome 

144. Through the Looking G 1 ass 

Carroll 

145. Treasure Island Stevenson 

146. Twice Told Tales.. Hawthorne 

150. Uncle Tom's Cabin Stowe 

164. Vicar of Wakefield. .Goldsmith 

158. Whittier's Poems.... Whittier 

159. Wide, Wide World . . . .Warner 

160. Window in Thrums Barrie 

161. Wonder Book Hawthorne 



IS. B. CONKEY SomPflHY'S POBLICflTIONS 

COMPLETE LIST OF THE POETIC AND PROSE 

WORKS OF 

Ella Wheeler Wilcox 



POEMS OF PASSION. 12mo, cloth, $1.00. Presentation 
Edition — white vellum, gold top. $1.50. Presentation 
Edition — half calf, gold top, $2.50. 

POEMS OF PASSION. Quarto, cloth. Illustrated 
Edition, $1.50. 

POEMS OF PASSION. Pocket Edition. Illustrated— 16mo, 
cloth, 75 cents; full morocco, gold edges, $2.50. 
Human nature is less of a mystery after the reading of this book. 
"Only a woman of geniua could produce such a remarkable 

work/ ^—Illustrated London News. 

MAURINE AND OTHER POEMS. 12mo. cloth. $1.00. 
Presentation Edition— white vellum, gold top, $1.50. 
Presentation Edition — half calf, gold top, $2.50. 
Beautiful thoughts and healthy inspiration in every line. 
"Maurine is an ideal poem about a perfect woman."— T/ie South. 

POEMS OF PLEASURE. 12mo, cloth, $1.00. Presenta- 
tion Edition — white vellum, gold top, $1.50. Presenta- 
tion Edition — half calf, gold top, $2.50. 
These poems make life doubly sweet and cheerful. 
"Mrs. Wilcox is an artist with a touch that reminds one of 

Lord Byron's impassionate strains."— Paris Register. 

THREE WOMEN. 12mo, cloth, $1.00. Presentation 
Edition — art binding, gold top, boxed, $1.50. 

Her latest and greatest poem. This marvelous narrative of 
thrilling interest depicts the lives of three good and beautiful 
women in every phase of weakness, passioji, pride, love, sympathy 
and tenderness. 

AN AMBITIOUS MAN. (Prose.) 12mo, cloth, $1.00. 

"Vivid realism stands forth from every page of this fascinating. 
book.'''— Every Day. 



WORKS OF ELLA WHEELER WILCOX (ConUnned) 

HOW SALVATOR WON AND OTHER POEMS- 12mo. 
cloth, $1.00. Presentation Edition — white vellum, gold 
top. $1.50. Presentation Edition — half calf, gold top, 
$2.50. 

A choice collection of recitations, specially compiled for read- 
ers and impersonators. 

"Her name is a honsehold word. Her great power lies in depict- 
ing human emotions ; and in handling that grandest of all passions 
—love— she wields the pen of a master."— T^e Saturday Record. 

CUSTER AND OTHER POEMS. Handsomely illustrated. 
12mo. cloth, $1.00. Presentation Edition — white vellum, 
gold top. $1,50. Presentation Edition— half calf, gold 
top. $2.50. 

A grand epic of the exploits and massacre of the immortal 

Custer. 

"One cannot help gaining new impetus for the spiritual exist- 
ence from coming in contact, mentally, with such ideal sentiments 
and emotions as this rarely gifted poetess voices in magnificent 
verse."— Universal Truth. 

AN ERRING WOMAN'S LOVE. 12mo, cloth. $1.00. 
Presentation Edition — white vellum, gold top, $1.50. 
Presentation Edition — half calf, gold top. $2.50. 

"Power and pathos characterize this magnificent poem. A 
deep understanding of life and an intense sympathy are beauti- 
fully expressed."- rrt6ime. 

MEN, WOMEN AND EMOTIONS. (Prose.) 12mo. heavy 
enameled paper cover, 50 cents ; English cloth, $1.00. 
A skillful analysis of social habits, customs and follies. 
"Her fame has reached all parts of the world, and her popular- 
ity seems to grow with each succeeding year."— .American iVewsman. 

THE BEAUTIFUL LAND OF NOD. (Poems, songs and 

stories.) With over sixty original illustrations. Quarto, 

cloth, $1.00. 

The delight of the nursery. A charming mother's book. 

"The foremost baby's book of the world."— New Orleans 
Picayune. 

PRESENTATION SETS. Poems of Passion, Maurine, 
Poems of Pleasure, How Salvator Won, and Custer, are 
supplied in sets of 3, 4, or 5 titles, as may be desired, in 
neat boxes, without extra charge. 

ELLA WHEELER WILCOX'S WORKS are for sale by leading book- 
sellers everywhere, or will be sent postpaid on receipt of price by 
the Publishers. .„, ^, . 

W. B. CONKBY COMPANY^ Chicago 






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